


I Love It When You Look My Way

by tranquilatlast



Series: I Love Everybody Because I Love You [1]
Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Eddie Kaspbrak Loves Richie Tozier, Fluff and Angst, Gay Eddie Kaspbrak, Gay Richie Tozier, High School, Kiss Kiss Fall in Love, M/M, Post-Canon, Practice Kissing, Richie Tozier Loves Eddie Kaspbrak, They're gay your honor, they're like 17 in this and then they're 18
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-26
Updated: 2020-04-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 00:28:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 26,310
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23856124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tranquilatlast/pseuds/tranquilatlast
Summary: "So wait, you've literally never kissed anyone before?" Richie asked, staying still on the hammock to look at Eddie."What's it to you, asshole?" Eddie snapped back."I could teach you," Richie blurted out. Eddie froze, suddenly wide-eyed and bewildered."You've never kissed anyone either, fucknut," he said finally. Richie shrugged far too nonchalantly."How hard could it be?"
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Series: I Love Everybody Because I Love You [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1719166
Comments: 17
Kudos: 164





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> this is my first r+e fic and i meant for it to be short but it got away from me! so much so that i'm gonna try to write more for this! the boys are 17 in this until their bday passes, and they're in their senior year of high school.
> 
> disclaimer! i'm 17 myself!
> 
> hope you enjoy!

"Never have I ever…" Eddie paused for a moment and looked around the group, "... uh, drank water from a hose." Majority of his friends groaned from where they sat in the cool Clubhouse. It was a little colder underground than it was outside, but at least the crisp February air felt nice to breathe in.

"Oh, fuck you," Richie said, putting a finger down so he had two left up. The others followed suit, glancing around at each other’s hands. Ben was the only one besides Eddie to keep his fingers up. "Ben, do you ever even go outside?"

"I do. I just don't drink hose water," he defended, shifting his weight across his feet a little. Richie rolled his eyes and lightly dragged his shoe across the ground to swing the hammock a bit. He liked to do it now that he could, ever since he kept growing and growing over the past few years. By the time this year was over and he'd graduated, he wouldn't be able to fit in this thing at all. "It's not even cold a lot of the time, anyway," Ben finished.

"B-But still," Bill said, grabbing the cup in front of him, "everyone d-does it." Mike mimicked Bill and picked up his own cup, nodding. They sat next to each other on the floor of the Clubhouse.

"That is _so_ unsanitary. This is why I don't share drinks with you guys," Eddie said matter-of-factly, watching as his friends took a sip of their colas. Mike just shrugged and grabbed the two-liter of soda to refill his cup before setting it back down. The swing he was sat on moved back and forth slightly.

“It’s summer, Eds,” Richie assured him, a big grin on his face, “soon, we’ll get you drinking the finest seventy-degree hose water Maine has to offer!” Eddie’s face screwed up, but Mike cut in before he could say anything.

"Dude, whatever. My turn." Mike set his cup down and, grinning, stared Eddie dead in the eyes from across the space. "Never have I ever used two fanny packs."

"Ugh, dick!" Eddie exclaimed, curling his hand into a fist and hitting the floor. The other Losers laughed as he begrudgingly took a sip of his drink. He gulped it down quickly and slammed the cup down (as much as one could "slam" a plastic cup, anyway) before pointing at his ambusher angrily. "They're _convenient_ and _practical!"_

"That's exactly what I told Mrs. K when I saw her knockers for the first time." Richie barely finished the joke before Eddie threw his cup at him. It bounced off his forehead when he cringed back, a big grin on his face.

"Okay, you guys, relax! My turn. Never have I ever..." Ben had one finger up as he chuckled. The boy thought for a moment before toeing the dirt floor with his shoe to swing a little bit. "Hm. Never have I ever kissed a girl."

Eddie put a finger down before anyone else could, and the Losers stared in surprise. He looked at all of them, who were obviously put-out.

"I've kissed my mom," he said innocently. The rest of the Losers nodded, slumping down again. Richie just about had a heart attack for a second, there.

"Yeah? I've kissed her, too," Richie laughed, and Eddie shrieked with rage as he reached over to grab a magazine and rear his arm back to throw it at him. Richie just cackled, being an asshole, and even snorted when Eddie threw the magazine onto the floor instead.

"Ben, did you mean kiss, or _kiss?"_ Mike asked, crossing his arms with his cup in one hand. Ben shrugged, but seeing as mothers suddenly counted, everyone in the group put a finger down if they hadn't already.

"Okay, then… N-Never have I ever kissed a girl who isn't family," Bill suggested, even though it was Richie’s turn. Bill, Ben, and Mike put a finger down. Mike was hounded immediately, letting out little laughs and shielding his face away from the others in embarrassment. Richie could barely complain about his lost turn or get a joke out through his surprised guffaws.

"So wait, you've literally never kissed anyone before?" Richie asked a few hours later, staying still on the hammock to look at Eddie. Everyone else had left, but there was still bright sunlight shining down into the Clubhouse. They all had things to do back home, including homework Richie had finished and Eddie had copied off of him. Eddie didn't feel like going home, and they didn't even have to look at each other to know Richie would follow him wherever he went.

Across the room, Eddie frowned, his brows furrowing and jaw clenching in a way that made him look _extremely_ cute. Rich was whipped.

"What's it to you, asshole?" Eddie snapped back. Richie took in his friend's hunch, his downturned mouth, his crossed arms as he glared down into the dirt.

 _It's just surprising,_ he thought to himself. _How could anyone not want to kiss you?_

"At least we got that in common," he said instead. Eddie looked up at him, and he snorted. "The fact that the only action we get is from your mom, I mean."

"Dude, shut the fuck up, that is so fucking gross." Eddie kicked dirt up towards the hammock, making the other boy laugh. Then, without really thinking about it,

"I could teach you," Richie blurted out. Eddie froze, suddenly wide-eyed and bewildered. Shit. Shit, shit, shit. His mouth opened, but Richie quickly continued before he could say anything. "Like, we're seniors and summer's coming up in a few months and neither of us have even had a girlfriend yet. We're getting pretty close to _real_ girlfriend territory, like, fucking around in college kinda shit, and you don't have any skills. I pity you, dude."

Another beat of silence. Eddie kept staring, and Richie suddenly became super aware of how dusty the Clubhouse was. It felt like his lungs stopped working.

"You've never kissed anyone either, fucknut," Eddie said, the waver in his voice making it less sharp than he probably meant for it to be. Richie blinked once before shrugging far too nonchalantly.

"How hard could it be?" He hoped his grin was cocky enough to distract from the way his hands were shaking. He flipped his comic book closed and laid it over his chest, like that would keep his heart from beating straight through it. "That a yes?"

"Shut up, Richie." But before he could play it off as a joke, Eddie came forward and hopped up into the hammock. Richie automatically adjusted, the two boys becoming a brief mess of kicking legs and awkward scrambling for space before they settled down again. One disadvantage of their growth spurts was that it took a while to get situated in the hammock together; it was much easier to squeeze in when they were kids, but at the same time, Richie kind of liked how they were forced to touch more in order to avoid falling out.

Eddie propped a socked foot onto Richie's stomach, making him huff and rest his hand at Eddie's ankle. His own leg was outstretched, ending up at Eddie's side, right where his waist slimmed beneath his shirt. The position was familiar; never really addressed by anyone besides a few quirked brows from the other Losers. Even then, it became an unspoken norm after the first few times. Richie imagined the Losers just thought it was the trademark of Richie and Eddie—they were bound to be touching in some way at all times, and it wasn't weird at all.

Despite the familiarity, they couldn't quite meet each other's eyes. Richie's hand twitched nervously over his friend's ankle, but Eddie didn't bring it up. He flexed his fingers before relaxing them again.

"So what, like, practice?" the brunet asked. Richie shrugged for the second time. A few moments of awkward silence… then, "Okay."

"Okay?" Richie swore to all holiness that his heart stopped beating for a second. It took everything in him to keep still, like one shift could make Eddie change his mind and leave. His hand twitched again. He had to remind himself to breathe.

"I don't want to be a bad kisser when I get a girlfriend, do you even know how embarrassing that is?" Eddie said quickly, gesturing with his hand a little. "I'll take what I can get, dickhead, just brush your teeth before we do it."

"What, like, now?" Eddie hesitated before shaking his head. "Okay, uh… You can bring a toothbrush to my house tomorrow, if you want. My parents are off fucking in some motel for the weekend or something. Well—they called it business, so it might just be business. They left me money, anyway, in case you want me to buy, like, mouthwash or whatever."

"You don't use _mouthwash?_ You're so fucking disgusting, do you even floss, you idiot?" Eddie kicked at him, and Richie finally managed to laugh. "Do you even know how much plaque builds up when you don't clean your fucking mouth? No, no, I'm actually serious, Richie, stop fucking laughing!"

That led them to now. They were on Richie's bed, with Richie propped up against the headboard and Eddie leaning against the wall that the side of the bed was pushed up against. Richie kept his legs crossed, but Eddie took it to himself to stretch out so his socked feet dangled over the other side of the bed.

It was a really nice day outside (as it usually was in the few months before Derry summers, despite the town that didn't deserve it) but both boys weren't interested in leaving the room, much less the house. There were more important things to do; like stalling.

“No, no, it’s because they _leave._ They leave the tree, man, that’s the whole point,” Richie insisted for the third time. Eddie was torn between laughing at his earnest expression and fuming at his logic.

“Leaves is a plural for _leaf,_ there’s no correlation there! There’s none!” Eddie exclaimed, his hands out in front of him like the answer was in an invisible box. “Do you even hear the words you’re saying right now?”

“If there’s no correlation then why would they call them leaves, idiot?”

“Because there are multiple leaves!”

“That sounds false.”

“ _You_ sound false.” Richie shot a hand forward, right into Eddie’s side. The brunet barely dodged the tickle attempt, and Richie burst into laughter. "Hey! Your arms are too fucking long."

"Yeah? Wait till you see my wang," he snorted, reaching a foot out to get at his side one more time. Eddie flung himself away, arms flailing all dumb-looking.

"That is _so_ gross, don't even say that." Eddie was at the opposite end of the bed, a big grin on his face now, and turned to kick at Richie's legs. Richie kicked back, their game of footsie lasting until Eddie nearly fell over again.

"Okay, okay, truce!" Richie wheezed when Eddie managed to land a kick at his stomach. The shorter boy cackled and allowed himself to shuffle up so he was on the middle of the bed, legs criss-crossed. Richie spread his legs to give him the space, propping one up on Eddie's knee.

"Truce," Eddie agreed. He shifted a little in his spot, and Richie did the same, shifting his pillows further away until one dropped off the edge of the bed. They both looked at it, and when Richie moved his gaze to Eddie again, he noticed his gaze was still on the pillow, even as he spoke, "So… So—Hey."

"So, hey," Richie replied. Eddie looked up at him, then quickly flicked his gaze back to the pillow. Richie watched as he leaned back, placing one hand on his knee and the other on Richie's calf. Then he seemed to think better of it and let that hand drop to the mattress, though Richie swore his skin tingled at the brief contact.

"It's been, like, an hour," Eddie continued, dragging his gaze to the alarm clock at Richie's bedside. Richie nodded, wondering what he was getting at. Did he want to leave? Eddie was glancing around the messy room now, and Richie could practically see the nerves crawling over his friend's shoulders. He was about to ask what was up when Eddie finally made eye contact, and the words got caught in his throat.

"Should we brush our teeth now?" he asked, head tilted down so his big brown eyes pierced Richie through a fan of dark lashes. _God, his huge eyes. His fucking doe eyes._ A moment passed before Richie comprehended the question.

"Oh." Richie's brows shot to his hairline, a sudden burst of butterflies coming to life in his stomach. Eddie shrunk a little, mouth opening to say what he could only assume to be some sarcastic pick at his eloquence, but Richie quickly nodded. "Yeah! Yeah, no, if you still want to."

"If _you_ still want to," he shot back, like it was an insult. Richie nodded again, his glasses becoming a little askew, and tried to swing his leg over Eddie to get off the bed. He managed to kick Eddie's head instead.

"Ow! Motherfucker!" Eddie shouted, breaking through whatever weird tension there had been. Richie busted out laughing, until Eddie shoved his leg off his knee and he ended up falling to the floor in a mess of limbs. His shoulder became alight with a dull pain, but Eddie's laughter from above made him pleasantly warm all over.

After Eddie ended up on the floor too (courtesy of Richie, of course), and they wrestled for a few minutes, the pair finally made haste to the bathroom. There was still that underlying nervousness, even as Richie used his toothbrush to serenade Eddie as they brushed their teeth and got minty foam all over his hand.

He did, in fact, own mouthwash, to Eddie's pleasant surprise (which, “Why’d you think there was a bottle of this in _my_ bathroom, Eds?”). Eddie had brought his own bottle, and taught Richie how to properly use it. He even emphasized words like "gargle" and "swish", just to make sure Richie knew that he knew what he was talking about, and Richie didn’t feel like interrupting him.

When they got back to the bed, Richie climbed up onto it first. He bounced himself slightly when he dropped against the headboard, making himself comfy in the same spot he was before. Eddie didn't follow for a second, but eventually told him to "Scoot over, stupid," and took the spot right next to him. They looked at each other once, then promptly looked away.

"Okay." Eddie said, and Richie could feel the nervousness radiating off of him in waves. He hated feeling like Eddie was nervous because of him, even though the circumstances were… sort of unusual. But hey, it wasn't anything bad! He was just trying to help a friend out! He wouldn't actually offer just… for his own reasons. Richie wanted to say as such.

"Why so nervous, ol' chap!" he said instead, a Voice coming easy to him. He nudged Eddie so hard, the kid almost toppled off the edge of the bed straight onto the bedside table. Eddie yelped, but seemed more surprised than irritated. "We're just fellows doin' a good deed! Think of the future missus!"

"Yeah, yeah, shut up!" Eddie huffed, though he had a grin on his face as he caught himself and shoved Richie back. It wasn't enough to move him, but Richie took it to himself to comply and scooted over more until he was squished between the corner of the headboard and the wall to allow his friend more space. "Tell me again what makes you qualified to do this?"

"Duh," Richie snorted, dropping the Voice. He gestured vaguely to himself, and Eddie looked entirely unimpressed. "I don't need experience to be a kissing expert. I've seen enough of it happen in, like, the movies."

"The movies aren't real life, though," Eddie pointed out as he moved a little closer. He turned, too, so he was facing Richie a bit more. "And the kissing scenes barely last."

"I pay good enough attention," he claimed. "And even if I don't, which isn't the situation at all, we can figure it out on our own! How hard can it be? It’s just mouths."

"Right." It was then that Richie noticed how fidgety Eddie was getting, and how little he was looking at him. Eddie shifted around in his spot like he couldn't decide whether to get even closer or to fling himself off the bed. "Uh, maybe we should brush our teeth again or something, I don't know if—"

"Hey, Eds," Richie interrupted, letting his voice drop down to be reassuring. Eddie's eyes snapped from the wrinkled sheets to Richie's face. "You know we don't actually have to do this, right? Like, no, I wasn’t joking, I was serious about it, but—if-if you're backing out, I won't blame you. I'm having enough fun hanging out with you right now, burning mouthwash included."

"I'm not backing out," Eddie disagreed quickly, and his face was starting to get red. Richie would’ve made fun of him, except he felt like he was getting a little flushed, too.

"But you're nervous," Richie pointed out, trying to be nonchalant and doing a very bad job at it. Eddie frowned, his mouth twisting up and his nose scrunching a little.

"Yeah, but—but that's not because I don't want to, I—" His mouth clamped shut before he could finish, and Richie's curiosity was officially piqued. Before he could ask, though, Eddie continued, "Whatever, can we just fucking get to it already? I'm not nervous."

"Okay, Not Nervous," Richie conceded, hands up in surrender, "but seriously, dude. If you want to stop, you know you can just tell me, right?"

"Don’t call me dude right now," Eddie grumbled. But he nodded, leaning in a little, and Richie couldn't help but inhale slowly, "I trust you."

And then they were kissing. And it was… wow.

And really, okay, Richie couldn't deny the bad thoughts. He couldn't help but be reminded about how much he actually dreamed about this happening, about how kissing another person and that person being a boy was scary and new and _wrong,_ about how he knew he was a _fairy_ but never once got the courage to think about it for more than a few minutes, about how his parents might react if their getaway was cut short and they came home to their only son messing around with another boy in their house, in his room, on his bed, turning out to be _gay—_

Richie couldn't deny the bad thoughts, but each bad thought led to one thing: he was kissing Eddie Kaspbrak. _He was kissing Eddie Kaspbrak._ He was kissing Eddie Kaspbrak, his best friend, and Eddie felt so soft and warm and kind and nice. He tasted like gross too-strong mouthwash and holy shit his hand was coming up to graze against the front of Richie's shirt. His mouth was slow and perfect, and his lips slotted against his like they were meant to be there.

Richie felt like he was floating. If this is what being a fairy felt like, then he was never going to stop being one. Kissing his best friend was the best thing he’d ever experienced in his life, and he would never want to take it back, even if he could.

Eddie was the one to pull away, his fingertips still brushing Richie's chest through the worn fabric of his shirt, like he was too shy to lay his hand there and feel Richie's heart pounding against his ribcage. Richie had to take a second before his eyes fluttered open. Eddie's face was completely flushed, red glowing over his nose and cheeks, and his mouth was still parted and pink and a little slick with spit. Richie couldn't take his gaze off of that mouth, even as they moved to form words and it looked like they were in slow motion. Oh, he was saying something.

"Huh? What'd you say?" he asked dumbly. Eddie rolled his eyes, but the sarcasm was lost on Richie with his eyes being glossy and glazed in a way Richie had never seen them before.

"I asked how it was," Eddie replied. Richie's fingers twitched, brushing against soft skin and soft hair, _Eddie was so soft,_ and he suddenly noticed his hand was cupping the back of Eddie's neck. When did that get there?

"It was good," he said, voice a little strangled. He realized then the totally dazed expression must have been mutual, because Eddie's big brown eyes seemed to be drawn to his own lips, which he could feel were a little wet, too. Eddie's spit was on his lips, and it felt like they were tingling. Was the tingling a kissing thing or an Eddie thing? Was it both? "Hey, are your lips tingling?"

"Yeah," Eddie replied, and then they were kissing again, and Richie was a little more aware of how his hand flexed on Eddie's neck and pulled him a little closer. The pad of Eddie's thumb pressed against his clothed sternum, and the little touch spread all over his body and made him feel warm and fluttery all over.

Needless to say, the kiss was good. It was great! So Richie was kind of put out when they were both too nervous to talk about kissing more afterwards. Maybe Eddie didn't like it as much as he seemed to. Maybe Richie was being too eager or something. Whatever it was, Eddie had left his house soon after an awkward little excuse, something about needing to do chores at home. Richie had waved at him from his porch and got a middle finger and a grin back before his friend was off on his bike. He'd let his eyes linger until Eddie pedalled out of sight.

They didn't mention it when they saw each other again with the Losers the next day, which was an obvious agreement. The usual jokes and insults and laughter were shared without any tension, which was good, but they didn't get a moment to themselves amongst the rest of the group. They biked around town, over narrow sidewalks and wide streets, solid pavement and warm dirt, then stopped for snacks and took a long break at the park. The sun was still high in the sky when Bill suggested heading to the quarry.

"Not to swim," he clarified when Ben said he didn't think he wanted to jump, "we can walk around the b-bottom. Look at b-b-b—ah, shoot— _bugs_ on the ground, or something."

"We can look at birds in the trees," Ben offered, squinting up at nearby trees as if he could see any birds from the bench they sat on. "I've been learning some mating calls. I think I still remember the ones Stan taught me."

They fell quiet for a moment, thinking about their lost friend. Stan had moved two years ago, just a few months after school started. Just like Beverly, he’d promised to call, but never did. Richie didn’t like the silence, because he didn’t like thinking about Stan or Beverly (not unless he was in his room and could angry-cry), and blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

"The only mating call I need is Eddie's mom's phone number," he quipped. Eddie elbowed him sharply in the side, promptly ending the tense moment. "Ow! Asshole."

“Beep beep, Richie,” Bill said, shuffling away from the two so he wouldn’t get caught by a stray arm. Ben wasn’t even near the pair, but he scooted away after Bill.

"That didn't even make any sense, Richie," Eddie shot back. Richie tried to bat at his head, but Eddie just slapped at Richie’s forearm to get it out of the air. He kicked Richie's calf when he just tried to do it a second time.

"I'm up for it," Mike agreed, pointedly ignoring their shenanigans. Richie lightly punched Eddie in the stomach, making him yelp. As Eddie keeled over, he slapped Richie hard in the thigh right below his shorts. "If we have time, we can even head to the farm for some food after. I made some lemonade yesterday, and I was meaning to share it with you guys."

"I like lemonade," Bill nodded, a smile spreading across his face that the other boys couldn't help but return. He glanced at Eddie, who was glaring at Richie's big grin even as his thigh started to bloom pink. "Are you guys com-coming?" Eddie took the time to think for a second, likely trying to recall whether he had finished copying Richie’s homework for the day.

"Oh, I also read a book about bugs a couple weeks ago. I don't have it on me, but I can remember some of the cool-looking ones," Ben said thoughtfully, and Mike looked extra interested at that. "Maybe I can find some and point them out to you guys."

"Yeah? Maybe I can, too. We can put 'em in Eddie's hair like little accessories," Richie teased, bending his long fingers awkwardly to mimic spiders crawling up his shoulders and onto his head. Eddie shouted in objection and grabbed Richie's wrists so tight, his fingers froze up as his friend yanked them out of his hair.

"I'll come, but only to make sure Richie doesn't end up eating a fucking beetle or something," Eddie hissed, throwing Richie's wrists down so he lost balance while he laughed. Richie grabbed onto Eddie's shoulders to keep himself steady, and the brunet let him. "Dumbass."

"Good," Bill said, happy to have all his friends available. Richie made a sound like he was offended, letting his hands drop when Eddie decided he had enough and started batting at his wrists.

"Hey, you didn't even ask if I could come," he said. Bill didn't even blink, just shifted his stare to Richie before replying rather matter-of-factly,

"Eddie's going, of course y-you're going.” Richie made another noise, a blank “Huh.” more than anything. Then he threw his arm around Eddie’s shoulders, grinning widely even as his friend yelped and nearly fell over from the sudden weight.

“Looks like we’re off to the woods, Eddie Spaghetti!” Eddie paused in his struggle to throw Richie’s arm off to look up at him with his mouth all screwed up. “To grandmother’s house we go!”

“Your breath smells like cheap cheese puffs,” Eddie hissed, as if there was such a thing as expensive cheese puffs. Richie just let his mouth fall open and moved his head down to exhale right into Eddie’s face, only stopping to laugh when it made Eddie shriek and gag.

Richie was still coming down from the high of spending a warm summer’s day with his friends by the time the others were bidding their goodbyes and steering their bikes to separate from the group. The day was just starting to slip into night and they were steadily pedaling towards Eddie’s road. Richie opened his mouth to say something stupid, probably something about kissing Mrs. K goodnight, when Eddie interrupted him.

“Do you wanna kiss again?” Richie choked on his joke and his right foot slipped off his bike pedal. In less than a second, he was on his back on the pavement, staring straight up at the clouds drifting idly through the sky. “Oh, holy shit! Richie!”

He heard the chain of a bike being yanked back, then the clatter of the bike hitting the ground. A moment later, Eddie’s concerned face was blocking the wide evening sky. His brown eyes were wide with worry, and his brows were scrunched up into a funny little line. His hair had gotten messed up earlier when Richie had pretended to drop an ant into it and Eddie had freaked out, squawking indignancies as he frantically ran his hands over his head. Currently, some brown strands gave in to gravity and hung over his forehead.

 _Even upside-down, he’s pretty,_ Richie thought. _How does someone get to be that pretty?_

“Rich? What the fuck, are you okay? Are you hurt? Why the fuck would you suddenly stop like that you fucking dumbass, you flew over the handles and went rolling, you’re so fucking stupid, do you feel any pain? Do you need a bandaid? Richie? Do you have a concussion? How many fingers am I holding up?” Eddie held up three fingers.

“Yeah,” Richie said dreamily. Eddie jerked his head back a little, quickly becoming bewildered as he stared at his own hand.

“What? How many fingers is ‘yeah’?” Richie thought he might’ve wiggled his fingers as he counted them off, but he was too busy staring at Eddie’s face to notice.

“No, I meant—I mean, like, yeah, I wanna kiss you again.” Eddie looked back down at him, confused, then flustered, then irritated—but fake irritated, like when Richie cracked a joke at the wrong time and Eddie wanted to laugh, but didn’t want to encourage him. His face went a little pink, and Richie admired the soft color in dazed awe.

“Get up, idiot, are your parents home yet?” Richie shook his head. They would be gone for another day, and would probably stop somewhere to get him some vegetables, or something. Eddie pushed himself back to stand, then shuffled around to offer a hand to tug his friend off the ground. “Any scrapes? Cuts? Bruises? Did you hit your stupid head on the ground?”

“I’m all good, Eddie Spaghetti,” he chirped cheerfully even as he struggled to get his bike upright and mount it without tripping over the back wheel.

“I changed my mind. I hope you get run over by a car.” Richie laughed aloud and Eddie let his frown turn into a smile as he hopped onto his own bike. “Hurry up. Use the window and I’ll meet you in my room.”

The ride to Eddie’s house was a bit more rushed than their unhurried pedalling on the main road, but there was a new buzz in the air. Richie couldn’t help but grin to himself all the way to Eddie’s house, and briefly tried to school his expression into something normal until Eddie looked over his shoulder at him and he turned out to be smiling, too.

They both sneaked around to the right of the house to prop their bikes up against the side of it, and Eddie nodded up towards his bedroom window on the second floor before making his way back to the front door. Richie scaled the tree, barely having to think as his hands found the familiar nooks and crannies they’d been relying on for years. He pulled himself up with only a little difficulty, and reached out to open Eddie’s window with one hand before stretching his leg out to step on the windowsill. It was much easier to get in now that he’d hit, like, fifty growth spurts.

Richie barely had to strain to carefully hop into the room, huffing once he was inside. The window creaked a little when he pushed it down, leaving it open enough to shove his fingers under it when he needed to open it again. There. Mission accomplished. Now to sneakily brush his teeth, or whatever. Eddie kept a spare toothbrush for Richie hidden in his cabinet because he hated impromptu sleepovers turning into him going a whole day with “fucking disgusting morning breath, Richie, shut your fucking mouth until you learn to be a human being!”

By the time Eddie had eaten dinner and promised his mother to shower before going to bed, Richie had long since made himself comfortable on the bed with his breath minty fresh. He was nestled atop the clean sheets with a stray comic in his hands, and peeked over it when Eddie pushed the door open.

“No medical supplies for little ol’ me, Dr. K? Heartless,” Richie quipped when his friend carefully shut the door behind him. Eddie’s hand paused on the knob, and he paused to scrutinize Richie.

“Do you need any?” he asked back. Richie shook his head and Eddie locked the door. “Okay. Did you brush your teeth?”

“No, I was busy going through your mom’s underwear drawer.” Eddie’s face twisted, but before he could get worked up, Richie laughed at him and shut the comic. “I brushed my teeth! Don’t wanna cause any delay.” He wiggled his eyebrows for good measure.

“You’re so stupid.” Eddie came up to the bed and hopped onto his, letting himself bounce a little. Richie reached down to gently lay the comic on the floor, next to where he’d placed his worn shoes, as he pushed himself up to a sitting position. He decided to ignore the heat growing in his face and the nervousness filling his chest in favor of grinning at his friend.

“You love it.”

“Shut up.”

“Make me.”

Eddie shuffled forward on his knees to sit on the bed right next to Richie, both of them facing each other. He reached up to carefully take Richie’s glasses off, folding them and placing them in his lap. Richie blinked a few times as his vision became blurry, but didn’t protest. Soft hands came up to the sides of his face, and his hands twitched where they stayed planted on the bed sheets. He was afraid to touch Eddie, and his mind started to drift.

What if it wasn’t as good as the first time? What if Eddie didn’t actually even like the first time, and this was his last chance to be good enough at kissing for them to keep doing it? What if he put his hands on Eddie again and it became too much? What if—Eddie patted his face enough to get Richie’s attention.

“Quit thinking,” he said, though he looked a little nervous. “Uh, is this still okay? We don’t have to—I mean, if you’re second-guessing it—” Richie shook his head a little, careful not to shake Eddie’s hands off, and leaned forward.

“It’s okay. You still want to, right?” he asked, squinting a little and stopping just far enough to see Eddie clearly. When he was this close, he could see the freckles delicately spattered across his cheeks and the bridge of his nose. Richie wanted to count them all, but he would probably keep finding ways to get lost in Eddie’s doe eyes instead.

“Only if you do,” Eddie said, ever the gentleman. His hands were still on either side of Richie’s face, and his thumbs moved back and forth over his cheekbones a couple times. Richie wanted to melt into his palms and never leave.

“Okay,” he sighed a little, feeling like goo. Eddie grinned at him, then shifted a little to get closer. “Get to it, Eddie Spaghetti.”

“You’re the one who got me talking,” Eddie blamed without any bite. He leaned in and Richie’s eyes fluttered closed as their lips connected, slotting into each other without issue.

The slide of their mouths together was almost effortless, like it was coded into Richie’s fucking DNA. Eddie’s lips were soft and languid against his own, and Richie could feel his insides turning into liquid. He leaned up a little more, bringing his hand up to snake around Eddie’s back and rest at the middle of it to bring him a little closer. Eddie gasped a little, whether because the touch was unexpected or welcome or both, Richie didn’t know, but he could barely contain his shudder either way.

It was hypnotizing, the warmth cradling his face and the wetness over his lips. Richie didn’t know if, objectively, either of them was a good kisser, but it didn’t matter. He was just happy to be kissing Eddie. Eddie Eddie Eddie. Truly, this was the peak of his lifetime. Richie wanted to stay in this moment forever.

Unfortunately, his lungs disagreed. Eddie must have had the same problem, because he broke the kiss after a few more tender moments. They didn’t move too far from each other; Richie could feel Eddie’s exhales fanning over his lips as they both got used to breathing again. Again, Eddie was gently grazing his thumbs over his face, tracing over his cheekbones as if he could feel the blush transferring from Richie’s skin onto his careful fingers.

 _I want to kiss you forever,_ Richie wanted to say. _Your lips make me feel like I’m on another planet._

“You taste like toothpaste,” Richie said instead. Eddie snorted, and let his hands fall from Richie’s face. He tried not to feel sad over it.

“You do, too, idiot. We both brushed our teeth,” he said, the “duh” going unsaid. It was usually implied whenever any of the Losers were talking to Richie, really.

“Yeah? That do anything for you?” Richie asked, wiggling his eyebrows. Eddie burst into laughter before slapping his hand over his mouth. They both held their breaths, but heard no Sonia approach or ask what he was laughing at.

“Shut up, you’re gonna get us in trouble,” Eddie hissed, keeping his voice low as he lowered his hand to hit Richie in the arm instead. Richie snickered and took his own hands away, batting Eddie’s arm right back. Of course, this sprung them into a wrestling match, and Richie grinned every time Eddie’s silent laughter replaced the quiet of the room.

They settled down after a little while, talking and joking until Eddie had to take a shower and came back fifteen minutes later. By then, Richie had changed into a shirt and sweatpants that were far too big for Eddie. It was his go-to sleepover outfit, since Richie couldn’t keep any of his own clothes here or sneak them into the laundry without Sonia finding them. He liked to borrow the clothes, anyway, since they smelled like Eddie. They were pretty soft, too, from how often he slept over.

The boys fit together snugly on the bed when they lay down to read comics, and neither complained when Richie practically had Eddie squished up to his wall in order to keep from falling off. They’d relaxed enough to let themselves become absorbed in their individual comics, the only sound between them being the flipping of pages and quiet snickers at funny dialogue.

Eventually, though, Richie was drawn out of his reading when Eddie nudged at his leg with a socked foot. Richie just nudged him right back, until Eddie closed his comic and kicked Richie hard enough to get his attention.

“Ow,” he said, even though it hadn’t hurt at all. Richie let his own comic lay flat on his stomach, adjusting his glasses before looking at Eddie. “What’s up, Eds?”

“Don’t call me that,” he said, probably more out of instinct than anything. His brown eyes were trained on the ceiling, and he looked deep in thought. "Was it good? The kiss."

"Yeah, why?" Richie asked without missing a beat. Eddie didn't look at him, but he made a face. Richie could only see his profile, but he let his gaze traveled over his friend's grimace and furrowed brow, the curve of his jaw, the shell of his ear.

"We're supposed to be getting better at kissing. Or, like, learning how to kiss." He paused, and Richie watched his eyes dart around the empty ceiling for a second. "Isn't that why… I mean, that's why you suggested it in the first place. To practice. Before we graduate."

"Oh." Richie had forgotten about that. He suddenly felt a sick stickiness inside his chest, and he couldn't tear his eyes from Eddie's face. "Oh yeah. 'Course."

He was lying to Eddie, and he hated it. He was being a creep. What kind of person was he, offering help but really just meaning to find any excuse to kiss his best friend? Who the fuck does that? He was taking advantage of Eddie, and-and Eddie didn't know, and Richie found himself disgusting for it. Shame slinked over his body like a cold blanket, making his hand start to tremble and his jaw begin to clench.

What he was doing, lying about "practice kissing", it was so wrong. It was worse than wrong. He was betraying Eddie's trust, and he'd done it so easily, he'd done it twice! He had to break it off right now, it was too gross, it was bad, it was barely consent if Eddie didn't know the real reason Richie wanted to swap spit, it was—"Rich? What do you think?"

"Huh?" he choked out, his voice sounding fucked. Eddie finally looked over at him, and Richie must have looked horrible, because his eyes widened suddenly and the brunet quickly moved to lay on his side facing Richie. Richie panicked and sat up, but Eddie just followed.

"Rich? W-What's wrong? Are you okay, you're super pale." Eddie's hand came up to press gently against Richie's forehead, making him wince. Like he’d burned him, Eddie quickly took his hand away. "Are you hurt? Did I say something?"

"N-No, no, I—Fuck, give me a sec, Eds." Richie shoved his glasses off and pressed the heels of both hands to his eyes in one swift move. "Shit. Ah, what did you say? Sorry, I'm—I checked out for a minute there."

"Uh… yeah," Eddie said, sounding incredibly concerned, but understanding that Richie didn't want to talk about it. Richie tried extremely hard not to let any tears slip, or Eddie really wouldn't let it go. "I was just asking if you really did want to practice."

"What?" Richie's heart dropped to his toes. Eddie found out. He found out and he's going to kill him for it, or worse, shove him out of his house and stop being friends with him. He almost didn’t want to put his glasses back on, just to avoid being able to make out the features of Eddie’s face. Maybe he could let Eddie be blurry forever.

"No, just hear me out," Eddie insisted, and carefully took the frames from Richie’s grip to slide them onto his face himself. His face came into focus, and Richie’s breath caught in his throat at his open, hopeful expression. "We… Look, I don't think we're going to get girlfriends anytime soon. Not 'cause we'd be bad at getting girls, or—okay, maybe, but that's not the point. I don't think we'll date anyone by the time we graduate. This year is so busy already."

He looked so cute. Even when he was stumbling over his words a little, Eddie looked so perfect. His brows were furrowed a little, but not in a bad way; more like he was staring at a really dumb math problem, except he was staring past Richie’s face as he thought. His lips were downturned, but not quite frowning. Eddie gently brought Richie's hands down from where they’d started to run through his black hair and held them in his own hands as he continued,

"We don't need to kiss for practice. We can… I mean, if you want to, we can just… kiss for fun? I don't know, it's kinda dumb, but I'm—I think we _could_ use the practice, but we don't have to call it practice. I kind of… the only person I'd ever really be comfortable kissing is you, Rich.” Eddie was flushed already, but the color in his face seemed to get deeper. He avoided Richie’s gaze, but kept holding onto his hands. “I don't want you to think you're, like, the middle man. Or something.”

Eddie wanted to kiss. For fun. Richie was staring, dumbstruck, at his best friend. Eddie wanted to kiss him. Not even for practice, but just because he could? Or because he… _wanted_ to?

“Rich?” Eddie was looking at him again, but it was like he was straining to keep eye contact. He started to tense, looking a little more anxious as each silent second passed. “Richie? Is that okay?” Richie realized his jaw had dropped and he quickly closed his mouth with a tiny click of his teeth. Then he blinked a few times, like drawing himself out of a stupor. He shook his head, then nodded.

“Yeah. Yeah, no, yeah, it’s—that’s okay. I, uh…” He could very obviously feel the heat in his face, and immediately decided that if Eddie pointed out his blush, he would call him a raging hypocrite. “I actually wanted that, too. To, like, kiss for fun. If that’s okay.”

“Yeah,” Eddie echoed, nodding as well when Richie did it again. They were both nodding for a few seconds, and Richie almost wanted to laugh. He probably looked like a deer in headlights in his borrowed t-shirt and sweats that, despite being too big for Eddie, barely made it to Richie’s ankles. “If—I mean, why didn’t you say anything?”

“What, that I wanted to—?” Richie couldn’t even finish his sentence, he was so embarrassed. There was no reason to be, considering Eddie _just_ said it, but Eddie had always been braver than Richie. “I dunno, I just thought… I dunno.”

“You thought I’d say no?” Eddie’s gentle hold on his hands shifted a little, and Richie had honestly forgotten they were holding hands until he looked down. He’d been too focused on his face to notice, but now he was hyper-focused on the way Eddie’s hands looked as he turned them over to intertwine their fingers. “Well, I’m saying yes.”

When Richie looked up again, Eddie was staring straight at him, with a spark in his big brown eyes that hadn’t been there a moment before. He looked determined, and confident, and brave. He looked so _Eddie,_ and Eddie looked so perfect that Richie barely even realized he was moving until their lips met again.

This kiss was the most tentative out of the few they’d shared so far. Richie could feel Eddie freeze up at first, but then he’d melted against Richie and took one hand away from their loose grip to cup his cheek again. Richie leaned into Eddie’s palm, and as a response, Eddie pressed a little closer. Their mouths were slow and shy, but by the time they’d separated, Richie was dizzy with the feeling of it. Or maybe he’d been dazed after the other kisses, too, and he just couldn’t remember right now. What were they talking about?

“Was that okay?” Eddie breathed, his eyes a little unfocused. Was that how Richie looked, too? Richie nodded a little, wanting to bring his own hand up over Eddie’s to keep him there, but instead keeping it at his side.

“It was good,” he said honestly, too honestly, but Eddie smiled a little and Richie could have sworn he could feel himself melt right into the mattress. “More than good. Top ratings from Richie Tozier. Ten out of ten. Way better than your mother.”

“Oh my god,” Eddie scoffed out, the joke surprising him and Richie both. Eddie let his hand fall from Richie’s cheek, but before Richie could even come up with a protest it was on his upper arm, tugging him down. “Beep beep, Richie. Go to sleep, it’s late and that stupid joke made me feel like I haven’t slept in days, we have school tomorrow.”

“I wouldn’t say days, exactly, Eds; however, I’ve definitely kept Mrs. K up several _nights_ in a row—”

“Beep _beep,_ asshole! And don’t hog the fucking blankets next time, I swear to god, you come into _my_ room and have the fucking nerve…”

After that, their kissing became… not that big of a deal. Yeah, Richie felt his chest tighten and his face flush even thinking about it, but it wasn’t, like, a lie anymore. He knew he was doing it because he liked Eddie. Romantically. The point was, he used to freak out about taking advantage of Eddie by kissing under the guise of “practice”. After Eddie decided they were both hopeless in the sense of relationships, however, and they were kissing just for fun, Richie wasn’t really lying anymore.

He tried to rationalize kissing as just an activity, like sharing ice cream and dunking each other in the quarry. He and Eddie both wanted to share ice cream sometimes, right? And it wasn’t weird for Richie to notice their hands brushing as they traded off, or look away at the sight of Eddie’s tongue sticking out to lick at his—literal, mind you—Rocket Pop. It wasn’t weird for Richie to shove Eddie into murky water when he knew he would be shoved right back, or to note the warmth of Eddie’s hands on his bare shoulders. They were both high school seniors, and they would both be legal adults in March, and they were both _friends,_ and they both wanted to do _friendly activities_ with each other.

In this case, _friendly_ kissing was an activity. It wasn’t weird to think about it. Why would it be weird to think about it? This was just like every other thing they did together, except they actually had to have some shame over it. Couldn’t have the other Losers see them kiss and blow it out of proportion. It was just mashing their mouths together, really, why did it have to be a romantic thing?

Except Richie _knew_ it was a romantic thing. He didn’t want to go around kissing Bill, or Mike, or Ben, and definitely not Stan. Not even Beverly, if she hadn’t moved away all those years back (then again, he might be tempted to smack a kiss right on her lips if she turned up again. He missed Bev. They all did! Except, maybe he missed Stan even more than her, because now that he thought about it, he’d kiss Stan if he came back, too). He knew it was a romantic thing because it was an _Eddie_ thing. He’d only ever wanted to kiss Eddie.

And sure, he could probably try to unpack all that, but he could also just ignore his feelings and relish in the fact that kissing Eddie is something he could actually do now. Only in either of their houses after they’d brushed their teeth, really, but that was fine to Richie. He liked brushing his teeth now, just because it reminded him of Eddie. Well, everything did, but especially brushing his teeth.

Kissing Eddie just because he could was nice. It was great! Richie knew they wouldn’t ever do anything further than that, but he was more than happy. Ever since deeming it a friendly activity, it just became another part of hanging out. They’d have fun with the other Losers after school if they were able to, and then hang out alone together when they didn’t have to go home right away. It became an added way to relax after and jokes were told and snacks were shared and teeth were brushed. Richie and Eddie were still only best friends—now, they were best friends who also, like, made out.

That was the main thing, though, the best friend part. Even if they hadn’t started kissing at all, not even as practice, Richie loved Eddie as a friend, as a Loser, way before whatever else had developed after that. He thought about it every day, when Eddie was laughing at something he said or nodding along to what Ben was explaining or socking Mike in the arm after a playful insult or bumping into Bill when they were walking next to each other. He loved all the Losers, even the ones who had left Derry and lost their home phone numbers.

He loved all his friends in a different way than he loved his parents. He wasn’t sure he’d ever find anyone quite like any members of the Lucky Seven. It wasn’t like he wanted to. And Eddie was his best friend out of all of them, and he knew he was Eddie’s. These were probably the only things Richie could be sure of in his entire life. He was sure of it back during the rock fight, when they’d all finally found each other.

He was especially sure of it now, when his mother called him down to the living room a couple of hours after dinner and Richie had come down the stairs to see Eddie sitting with her on the couch. He’d been ready to complain about doing the dishes before doing the dishes, as usual, but the false rebellion died in his throat when he saw Eddie turn to look at him with big, sad eyes and a puffy, flushed face.

“Eds? Are you okay? What happened, are you hurt?” Richie jumped down the last few steps, not minding his socks, and rushed to the couch. His mom placed a hand on Eddie’s shoulder in that comforting “It’ll be okay,” Maggie Tozier way, before standing. “Eddie?”

“Just tired, Richie, it’s okay,” Eddie sniffed. Even though he seemed to have stopped crying, the fact that he'd started at all made Richie's chest cave in on itself. He flung himself into his mom's spot on the couch once she’d moved, already reaching out to touch Eddie, but hesitating a few inches from his arm.

“Would you like some tea before bed, Eddie?” Maggie offered, clasping her hands in front of her as she smiled kindly at the boy who was avoiding eye contact. Eddie took a second to consider this before nodding once, almost shyly, his gaze somewhere on the carpet. “Does your mother know you’re here?” Eddie hesitated again, and Richie lowered his hand to grab his friend’s hand instead, where it was gripping onto the shorts Eddie usually wore to sleep.

“Uh, she—I told her I was going to sleep. She won’t check on me, so she won’t notice,” he said quietly, voice a little stuffy from the tears and snot, and Maggie nodded in understanding when Eddie looked up at her. Without looking away, he let go of his shorts to flip his hand over and hold Richie’s just as tightly as he repeated, “She won’t notice.”

“Sounds good, sweetheart. If she does, and she calls, I’ll have to let her know you’ll be sleeping over. That okay?” Eddie nodded again, and Maggie finally shifted her gaze to Richie. She’d definitely noticed their hands, but didn’t bring it up (like all the things she noticed about Richie and Eddie, really). “Richie, tea?”

“I’m okay, ma. Thank you,” he said distractedly, bringing his other hand to place it over Eddie’s so it was sandwiched between his palms. He noted his mother’s footsteps retreating into the kitchen, and searched Eddie’s face for any signs of pain. Eddie had never gotten hurt before on nights like this, but Richie always checked.

He found nothing more than the blend of anger, sadness, and embarrassment Eddie usually wore whenever things at home became too much and he left to another Loser’s house for the night. He came to Richie's house most often, since his parents were understanding enough not to ask questions after a long talk with their son when they caught him sneaking Eddie out the first time. Eddie didn’t have to hide from the Tozier parents like he did most of the others, but sometimes he needed the other Losers’ company depending on what had gotten him so upset.

Eddie had showed up at Richie’s house tonight, meaning he’d rather not risk being caught and having to explain himself or risk a phone call home. Richie wouldn’t pry, and neither would his parents. He knew that Eddie knew he was welcome to tell them anything he wanted, whenever he wanted. For now, and maybe forever, Richie was just happy to provide the company Eddie wanted at the moment.

“Why, it’s me ol’ chap, Doctah K!” he said in his British Voice, grinning when Eddie lifted his head just to give him an eye roll. The corners of his mouth were already turning up, even as he sniffed again. “Come back for another cuppa, ‘ave ya?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Eddie said, even when he brought his other hand to place it on Richie’s so they had their hands stacked up. He looked at their hands, but Richie’s eyes kept darting around Eddie’s pink face. “Haven’t heard British guy in, what, an hour?”

“Downright shameful,” Richie confirmed. He bounced their hands up and down in some weird, crowded handshake, before they separated. Maggie came back with a cup of tea for Eddie, probably having had some water heating already to make herself a cup before Eddie came over. “Thank you for the tea, Miss!”

“I thought British people liked tea. Shame I didn't make you any,” she mused after Eddie was nursing his warm mug of chamomile and honey. Richie laughed a little and Maggie put her hands on her hips. “Eddie, you know where our spare toothbrushes are. I’ll wake you up in the morning to take you home. At least it’s a weekend, huh?”

Richie’s grin grew even as Eddie flushed a little. On mornings after Eddie snuck over, Maggie made sure to huddle the boys in the family car and make idle conversation on the way to Eddie’s block so neither of them would freeze on the way—especially now, with winter coming to an end.

Eddie was kind of embarrassed to have her know he was sneaking in and out of his own house, and even more embarrassed that she insisted the three of them have breakfast together before leaving (“Just some toast, Eddie, in case you can’t get to sleep before your mother wakes up!”). Still, Richie could tell Eddie and his mom got along really well. It was nice to watch, sometimes.

“You boys don’t stay up too late,” Maggie called as she made her way back. Eddie thanked her and she smiled over her shoulder in response, pausing in the kitchen doorway. “Richie, would you mind letting your father know Eddie’s come to visit? He’s in his study.” He gave her a thumbs-up, and his mom bid them goodnight before disappearing to make her own tea.

“Come along then!” he encouraged, standing and holding a hand to help Eddie up even though they both knew he didn't need it. Eddie took it and carefully moved to his feet, then followed after Richie as he gently led him towards the stairs. When they were about halfway up, Richie dropped the Voice to ask, “Are you okay, Eds?”

“I’m… I dunno,” Eddie answered honestly, and his voice was still small and shy. It was so unlike Eddie, and Richie felt his heart become a little heavier. His free hand was carefully curled around his cup of tea, and Richie made sure to keep his pace slow so he wouldn’t have to let go of their hands at the risk of Eddie spilling it. “I’ll be okay.”

“You’ll be okay,” Richie assured him, keeping his voice optimistic. He barely even had to try, because he knew it would be true. They made it to the second floor and passed Wentworth’s office, the door wide open. Without slowing down, Richie called, “Dad, Eddie’s here!”

“Hey there, Eddie,” Wentworth automatically called out in response, looking up in time to see Richie waving as he passed by with his friend trailing behind him. Eddie had time to smile bashfully and greet him. Went called out his goodnight with a smile as kind as his wife's, not mentioning the puffy eyes or remnants of a runny nose, and returned to his work. Richie grinned to himself as he caught the interaction over his shoulder, and finally led Eddie into his room.

“Welcome back to my humble abode,” Richie said grandly, letting their hands release each other as he gave a sweeping bow. Eddie shut the bedroom door behind him and gently kicked a stray button-up shirt on the floor out of the way as he floated to Richie’s bed.

“Your humble abode is your house, Richie,” he informed, immediately shoving a few pillows out of the way and making himself comfortable against the headboard. Richie got out of his bow only to bend over and pick a few things up off the floor, just so Eddie wouldn’t tell him to do it later.

“Yeah? I never got to greet you to my house earlier, either, so now you just look like an asshole," Richie joked. He threw his dirty clothes into his laundry basket, then followed Eddie to the bed and sat down, trying to keep his bouncing to a minimum.

Eddie sipped his tea, giving him a half-hearted glare over the rim of the cup. It was hard to take it seriously when the faint scent of chamomile and honey wafted into Richie's face, though, and Richie just laughed.

They goofed off for a little bit to get Eddie's mind off things, even if neither of them pointed that out. Richie was filled with even more fluttery feelings than usual when he got Eddie to laugh at some dumb anecdote he'd heard a hundred times before. Eddie started being a little more lively as they kept talking, and finished his tea somewhere between jokes and jabs and laughs.

By the time they were side by side in the bathroom, brushing their teeth and nudging each other out of the view of the mirror, it was like Eddie hadn't even been crying in the first place. In fact, they'd just been getting ready to actually go to sleep when it came up in bed.

"My mom, she…" Eddie faltered when Richie looked at him from where he was fixing the blankets over his chest, but relaxed a little when Richie offered a half-smile as encouragement. It was a little hard to see in the dark of the room, but neither of them moved to turn the lamp back on. "She was talking about college again. About how, like, I have to keep doing good in school or I won't get into a good college and I won't be able to take care of her, and… I don't… She's my mom, but…"

"She's your mom, so you want to take care of her," Richie supplied, keeping his voice low to keep from riling Eddie up. His job right now was to listen, and he would do it. He didn't want to let Eddie blow up, not when they were both lying next to each other beneath the covers of his cramped twin. Eddie had turned the bedside lamp off fairly quickly, which made Richie think he didn't want to show his face. Richie's glasses were already off anyway, so it didn't matter much. "But…"

"Yeah. But. She's my mom, so I want—I feel like I _have_ to take care of her. And I will." It sounded like Eddie was trying to convince himself of this, like he thought it was his responsibility when it really wasn't, not when Sonia was the way she was. Richie decided to keep his mouth shut, though, and let Eddie get it out. " _But_ it's like... I don't like feeling like that's the only reason she wants me around. She could hire a nurse if all she wants is me to help her out instead of... living a life without her over my shoulder all the time. Without her curfew or chores or lectures. You know?"

"Not firsthand," Richie admitted, folding his hands neatly over his stomach as he stared at the blurry ceiling. His eyes were adjusting to the dark, but without his glasses, it wasn’t like he could make anything out even then. "But… yeah. I think I know what you mean."

"Probably not." It didn't sound like Eddie was trying to be mean; he was just stating a fact. "With your parents? You wouldn't know what I mean. I wouldn't want you to."

"I wish you didn't have to," Richie uttered, the words squeezing out of his throat and making him shut his eyes tight. Eddie went quiet for a moment, and Richie sniffled. Aw, fuck. Why was he crying? He didn’t know the half of what Eddie had to go through every day, what he had to go home to. “Sorry.”

“Hey, it’s okay,” Eddie laughed a little, but his voice cracked a little in a way that couldn’t be blamed on puberty. They were far past that, anyway; they were both almost grown-ups, albeit in the awkward, newborn stage of adulthood. Together. “Hey… Richie. Rich, look at me.”

Richie blinked his eyes open, then shut them immediately afterwards when tears finally slipped out. Then he felt the bed dip as Eddie shifted, before a hand lightly came up to his cheek and a thumb lightly swept over the corner of his eyes, without his glasses there to be in the way. Richie opened his eyes, and Eddie was so close, his face wasn’t even that blurry. It was a little flushed, and his eyes were a little damp with the start of tears, but there was a small smile on his face.

“I’ll be okay,” he repeated from what must have been hours ago, when they were first coming up the stairs together. Richie shifted, too, so they were both on their side facing each other. He was desperate to be close to Eddie, to breathe his air, and see all his freckles in perfect detail without his dumb lenses in the way. “It’s just my mom. She’s just… too much sometimes.”

They both knew that covered none of Sonia’s behavior. Richie wondered, not for the first time, what would happen if he’d asked Eddie never to go home again. He wondered whether they could leave together, get jobs together, find an apartment together, and be away from all the people in this town that didn’t want them in the first place. Derry didn’t deserve Eddie Kaspbrak. Really, no one deserved Eddie Kaspbrak. Richie definitely didn’t.

It hit him just then that if he really wanted to, he could move forward just a few inches and they’d be kissing. _Eddie would probably let me._

“I’m glad we’re friends,” Richie blurted out instead, meaning every single word despite not even thinking to say them. Eddie’s smile grew a bit bigger, and his hand fell from Richie’s face. He brought his arms up to his own head, one hand beneath the pillow they shared and one hand on top.

“I’m glad, too,” Eddie said, and how could Richie ever ask for more when he was already lucky enough to have this? Richie could feel himself making goo-goo eyes at his best friend, but couldn’t bother trying to hide it. Eddie stared at him for a few seconds, then decidedly made a face. “Now stop being a baby, Richie, you’re gonna get snot all over the pillow.” Richie laughed, kicking Eddie’s leg beneath the sheets.

“This is _my_ pillow, you little turd, you could sleep on the floor for all I care,” he snorted, even as he swung his leg over Eddie’s, anyway. Eddie grumbled when it tugged the sheets down a little, and then squawked out an indignity when Richie pulled most of the blanket away from him with a mighty tug.

Their wrestling match was interrupted by Maggie knocking gently on the bedroom door before she shut the hallway lights off. It took them another twenty minutes after that to stifle their giggles, but the night caught up to them eventually. Eddie ended up falling asleep first.

His head rested on the squishy area above Richie’s armpit, nestled under the arm Richie had slung around his shoulders to rest on Eddie’s side. His brown hair looked black in the darkness, and his head was tilted in a way that didn’t let Richie see his face. Richie could feel Eddie’s warm breath fanning over his chest, in rhythm with the rise and fall of his side as he slept. It felt like he belonged there.

Richie’s free hand was on his own chest, at the left side right next to Eddie’s head. If he stayed still, he could feel his own heart beating beneath his soft shirt. It was slow and steady, even as Eddie’s body pressing into his made him dizzy. The beating of his heart now was incredibly slow—nothing like how it raced when they were kissing, with Eddie’s mouth sliding against his, their hands moving over each other’s necks and arms, their occasional smiles that allowed their teeth to become too involved.

“You’ll be okay,” Richie said to no one. Eddie was undisturbed, his breaths continuing evenly. Richie ran his hand up and down Eddie’s side once, feeling the faint outline of his ribs through the fabric of his pajamas. Eddie snuggled away from the light touch, his cheek nuzzling further into Richie’s chest. _You’ll be okay,_ he thought, not wanting to wake him up.

Somehow, Richie believed it. He hoped that Eddie did, too.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> welcome back! hope you enjoy!
> 
> cw: things get a little frisky above the belt in this one, around the time eddie starts bugging richie about sharing his ice cream. if detailed mouth-to-chest written by a 17 yro (me!) bothers you, you'll want to stop at "Richie, come on, take off your shirt," and ctrl+f to "You're... my best friend, dude, I don't know."
> 
> if there's anything else at all i should tag, please let me know!!! thanks for reading!

That night was far from the first time they'd fallen asleep so close like that, and it was probably far from the last. Still, after that night, Richie noticed Eddie had become touchier than ever. There wasn’t much change in public, considering what kind of a town Derry was. When they were out and about, Eddie kept to the usual side bumping and arm punching and shrugged Richie off when he slung his arm around Eddie’s shoulders to be gross.

When it was just their friends around, Eddie and Richie sat close enough for their knees to bump and their shoulders to connect. They didn’t mind getting into a play fight and rolling around, throwing weak kicks and punches through loud belly laughter. They certainly didn’t stop tangling their legs together in the hammock, even when sometimes they’d come dangerously close to falling out of it. The Losers would laugh off the physical displays of affection and continue whatever it was they were talking about.

In secret, though (and Richie would never say this in case Eddie yelled at him for a few minutes straight), it was like Eddie couldn’t get enough. He was touching Richie all the time. He’d rest his hand on Richie’s calf when he stretched out his leg in the hammock, swing his legs over to be in Richie’s lap when they were sat down side-by-side.

Eddie would run his hands through Richie’s hair even when they weren’t kissing, knocking his glasses askew over and over until RIchie had no choice but to take them off and focus on the feeling of Eddie’s fingers gliding over his scalp. When they _were_ kissing, Eddie would grab Richie’s hand that wasn’t already cupping his neck and move it down to rest on Eddie’s waist.

Richie definitely didn’t mind. Eddie was already straightforward without making a big deal out of what he wanted. The most he’d ever talk about it would be by asking “Is this okay?” when he started to loop his arms around Richie’s shoulders from behind and “Can I do this?” when he wanted to latch himself onto Richie’s back during sleepovers. Eddie always asked before following through, and Richie always answered with a painfully bad nonchalant expression and a few eager nods.

It was cute, and really nice to know that Eddie cared about where Richie’s boundaries lied. Richie almost wanted to admit he had no boundaries when it came to Eddie’s touch, but figured Eddie would keep asking anyway. Richie liked hearing Eddie ask him for things, especially if Richie was _very_ happy to provide.

(“Is this okay?” Eddie had gasped into Richie’s mouth one afternoon, swinging one leg over Richie to straddle his lap. Richie’s brain had practically fizzed out, and it took him a second to register that Eddie was hovering over him patiently.

“Yeah, that’s—Yeah,” Richie managed to say, cueing Eddie to slink down over his thighs and lick into his mouth. They hadn’t escalated past that, but Richie was lucky Eddie had to leave soon after. Something of his own _had_ escalated, and Richie practically flew up to his room to take care of it the second the front door shut behind his friend.)

Alternatively, Eddie could be a stubborn little shit when he wanted to be. Like now, for example, when he had practically inhaled his ice cream cone and kept bugging Richie to share his. The Losers had been wandering around town after lunch on their lazy Saturday, and were currently paying no attention to their friends bickering in the alley opening next to Derry’s only ice cream parlor. Really, they were just letting time pass until they’d bike to the edge of town to meet Mike in an hour.

“Just give me a little, I won’t even take that much, asshole, I’m fucking hungry,” Eddie demanded, trying and failing to push past the forearm Richie had planted across his chest. Richie’s other hand was outstretched to keep his cone away as he struggled to keep his friend away from his delightful snack.

“I literally gave you most of the chips earlier,” Richie argued mostly-playfully, turning a little when Eddie tried to step to the side. Eddie placed a hand on Richie’s face, hard enough to press his glasses dangerously close to his eyeball. He almost laughed, but then Eddie’s hand came dangerously close to snatching his cone. “And you stole half my orange at lunch after you finished yours!”

“I haven’t had ice cream in weeks, dickface.” Richie managed to lean back enough that Eddie’s hand slipped away, but now his glasses were practically half-off his face. Even without adequate vision, Richie could make out the scowl on his friend’s face.

“Me neither! Buy yourself another cone, fucknose!” Eddie paused at that, and Richie froze, too. Then the moment was over, and Eddie practically threw himself forward in another attempt to grab at the ice cream.

“I’m saving my allowance,” he grumbled, a little too serious for Richie to want to elaborate. Instead, Richie gave a goodhearted roll of his eyes and grabbed Eddie’s wrist to keep it still. Eddie froze, his other hand gripping at Richie’s shoulder.

“Fine, have this one. I’ll go buy myself another, if you’re going to keep being fussy over it,” Richie teased, placing the cone in his friend’s hand. He was intending to give it to Eddie all along, but he had fun feeling his lean chest pressed up against his arm, puffed up in indignance. He was like one of those little birds they liked to stare at with Stan, puffing his teeny feathers out.

“I’m not being fussy,” Eddie hissed even as his expression let up and he leaned off of Richie. Seemingly content, he licked at the ice cream with absolutely no complaints about Richie’s tongue being all over it. Richie guessed having his tongue directly in Eddie’s mouth kind of put them past being grossed out by second hand spit.

“Not even a ‘thank you’? ungrateful heathen. I’ll be back, guys.” The Losers didn’t pay him much mind besides a little smile and nod from Ben, the sweet kid. Richie grinned back before turning on his heel, and after a few seconds he heard Eddie’s quick footsteps pattering behind him.

A few minutes later, Eddie whined into Richie’s mouth as he desperately pinned him against a grimy brick wall behind the ice cream parlor. Their chests were pressed together, and Eddie’s hands were roaming so much Richie barely knew what to do with his. Their mouths were sloppy and wet, with too much tongue between too many sounds and too many gasps for air. It was the hottest thing Richie had ever done in his life.

“Eddie—” Richie managed as his friend grabbed at his arm, then his waist, then his hip. They both graciously ignored the tenting in Richie’s shorts. “Eds, we gotta—Our friends are waiting for us, we should, we have to, _oh my god.”_

“Keep talking,” Eddie breathed, having moved down to kiss wetly against the smooth skin of Richie’s neck. His swollen lips dragged over right beneath Richie’s jaw, smacking over his adam’s apple, licking at where his pulse was ready to climb right out of his throat.

“I dunno what I was talking about,” Richie admitted, seeing nothing but stars as his eyes fluttered. He was alternating between melting into the building and anxiously glancing around for anyone who might want to show up to take a leak. “We should— _fuck,_ what the hell are you doing to me, dude?”

“Tasting you,” Eddie muttered as he grabbed Richie's shoulders, and Richie swore his knees turned to liquid for just a second. How was his dick not busting through his zipper right now? “We’ll be done, just gotta, just… Richie, come on, take off your shirt.”

Richie was still scared out of his skin considering he was literally being mauled by some new, freaky, horny Eddie in broad daylight; but then the new, freaky, horny Eddie looked up at him with half-lidded half-moon eyes, and parted lips that were bruised a pretty little red. _How could anyone say no to that?_ he thought. Or maybe he said it out loud. He could hardly tell the difference.

Richie’s shirt was on the ground in less than a second, and he nodded frantically when Eddie asked for permission. Eddie bent at the waist and splayed his small hands across Richie’s pale white chest. His index and middle fingers framed Richie’s nipples, like they were some sort of—sort of—”Oh, holy _shit_ that feels really good.”

“Yeah?” Eddie asked a little smugly, before running his tongue slowly over one of the pink blooms between his fingers. Richie let out an embarrassing whine, but all it seemed to do was spur Eddie on. Richie brought one hand up to run through Eddie’s hair, the other staying helplessly flat against the wall. “I’m the only person who’s ever done this to you, huh?”

“What’s gotten into you, Eds?” Richie managed, half chuckling and half moaning. Eddie teased a bite as his nipple before swirling his tongue around it and then moving to the other one. “I mean, don’t— _ah_ —get me wrong, I’m digging it, but you should—should tell me what happened so I know what to do next time, y’know?”

“What do you _think_ happened?” Eddie might have sounded irritated if he didn’t sound so into what he was doing. One of his hands pinched at Richie’s wet nipple as the other one trailed to grab at the soft part of his waist again. If Richie weren’t half braindead, he would’ve been kind of self-conscious about Eddie groping at his lovehandles.

“Thinking really isn’t—I don’t think I’m capable of it right now. Oh my god.” Eddie sucked at him lightly before pulling away, but his hand didn’t stop pinching when he stood up again to lick at Richie’s neck. Richie’s hands fell to the waistband of Eddie’s shorts. Not the red ones, unfortunately, just some boring khakis he still fit into after a couple of years.

“That girl was coming onto you, Rich,” he huffed. He sounded a little upset, and Richie’s eyes fluttered open. He didn’t know how long they’d been closed, but it took him a second to focus on Eddie’s frown. Eddie allowed the recovery time, probably figuring Richie wasn’t getting much blood to his brain at the moment.

“What girl?” he asked, a little dazedly. Eddie gave a meaningful nod to the building behind him, and Richie had to make an actual effort to think for a second. “The girl, uh… Oh, shit, in the ice cream parlor? What are you talking about?”

The employee behind the counter had been a girl with a name Richie could never remember, but who he recognized from school. She was nice enough, considering he rarely talked to anyone who wasn’t a Loser. He had at least one of them in all his classes, usually, and never really found the need to make other friends in class.

“She called you funny,” Eddie pouted, and his thumb absentmindedly pressed against the pink little nub on Richie’s chest. Richie tilted his head back against the wall at the feeling, and groaned quietly when Eddie pressed a lingering kiss to the base of his throat. “And you guys talked.”

“Yeah, about how much I owed her for the ice cream.” Then it hit Richie, what was going on right now, and he wasn’t upset so much as bewildered. He rolled his head back forward to raise his brows at Eddie. “Were you jealous because our classmate and cashier was polite to us?”

“She looked at you, like—in, like, a… a girl way,” Eddie defended, finally letting his hand slip off Richie’s chest. His brows were furrowed, and Richie ducked his hands below Eddie’s t-shirt to fiddle with the belt loops on his khaki shorts.

“You were jealous,” Richie repeated, blinking down at the pouting boy who had his mouth all over him just two seconds ago, but who was suddenly too flustered to make eye contact. “Of… me talking? To a person?”

“Don’t make it sound so stupid, asshole.” Richie squawked a little as Eddie lightly backhanded his stomach. He glared at nothing in particular, but the tilt of his head made it look like he was frowning at Richie’s bellybutton. “I don’t know. Forget it.”

“Why were you jealous?” Eddie didn’t answer. Richie tugged at his belt loops a little bit, careful not to bring him too close lest he get a little too close to his tent. Eddie just sighed and patted his wrists until he let go. “Eds?”

“You’re… my best friend, dude, I dunno.” Eddie crouched briefly to grab Richie’s t-shirt, then shook it out a little to get the weirdly damp alley dirt out of it. Richie’s heart did a funny little thing where it swooped in, like, a circle.

“Yeah. Yeah, duh, we’re best friends.” _Except you were, like, devouring my nips just now, “dude.”_ Richie accepted the shirt when Eddie shoved it into his hands, and started to tug it on. When his head was through the hole at the top, he continued, “You know you don’t have to be jealous, right? I barely paid attention to what that girl said. I just wanted to get ice cream.”

“Yeah, what a waste.” They both looked down, where Richie’s newly-bought ice cream cone was perfectly upside-down and melting into the dirt a few feet away from them. They looked at each other again, and Richie’s face screwed up at the state of Eddie’s hair.

“You’re the one who stole my shit and made me buy a new cone, dumbass, don’t call me a waste when you’re literally the reason it’s wasted.” He started trying to fix the total rat’s nest on Eddie’s head, patting and brushing and stroking. Only one of his arms had gotten through his shirt, though, and Eddie started helping him get dressed properly.

“Whatever, you were mostly done with your cone anyway. I just asked to get a few licks in, you’re the one who gave me the entire thing,” Eddie replied, maneuvering Richie’s skinny arm through his shirt sleeve. Richie managed to get his shirt on just as he decided Eddie’s hair looked neat enough. He wiggled his brows as he tugged his shirt down, pretending he wasn’t flushed in the face and sporting a semi.

“Yeah, and you ended up licking that and then some, huh?” Eddie shoved at him, but Richie was already up against the wall, so it didn’t do much. He laughed, and Eddie failed to fight back a smile as he backhanded his stomach again. “Thanks for sharing some ice cream spit with my nipples, dude.”

“Don’t be fucking gross,” Eddie said, like he wasn’t the one to get his mouth all over Richie in the first place. Richie just snorted, trying to focus on getting his lower half under control before they had to step out into the main street again.

“I’m only gross because _you’re_ gross.” Richie switched into an affronted southern newscaster Voice, placing a hand over his forehead. “This just in: Eddie Kaspbrak’s _scandalous_ true colors! Ice cream hoggin'! Jealous tantrums! Chest suckling! What _evah_ will he do next? Lock yer doors, I say, lock yer doors!”

“Next time we get ice cream, I’m gonna smash a cone right into your face.” Eddie started walking off, nudging the ice cream cone with his shoe as he walked past. Richie was quick to follow, as always, and picked up the intact cone as he went. “If you eat that, I’ll take you out before the fucking alley microbes do. Richie, if you put that in your mouth I’ll literally never kiss you again.”

“Five second rule, Eddie, baby,” Richie exclaimed, opening his mouth exaggeratingly wide. Eddie shrieked and slapped the cone out of his hand before it could touch Richie’s lips, sending him into a laughing fit.

They met up with the Losers again, and when they all raced to the dirt road leading up to the Hanlon farm and then up to the farm itself, Eddie was the one to win. Mike personally handed him a large glass of sweet tea as congratulations, then took care to serve the others, too.

When the day was done, they snuck Richie into Eddie’s room to makeout some more (after they stopped by the Toziers’ to get Richie a shower, because “If you get alley germs all over my bedsheets, I’ll kick you out myself!”). They didn’t really discuss it, but the alley had been the most they’d ever done. Both of them were practically buzzing by the time they’d brushed their teeth and bounced onto Eddie’s bed after locking the door.

“You have to— _mmm_ —come with me to the diner tomorrow,” Eddie murmured into his mouth, perched on Richie’s lap with his hands on either side of his face. Richie held firmly to Eddie’s thighs, swiping his tongue past his lips just as Eddie did the same. They melted into each other at the wet slide of their tongues, and Eddie’s back arched a little.

“Okay. Why?” Richie hummed in reply, moving one hand around Eddie’s ass to trace the arch of his spine. His friend shuddered, and Richie marveled at the twitch of Eddie’s muscles beneath his fingertips. His hand slipped under Eddie’s shirt. “Can I touch here?”

“Yeah, sure, yeah,” Eddie said eagerly, tilting his head a little to lick into the corner of Richie’s mouth. Richie could make out every bump of Eddie’s spine with his hand, and reached further up to feel the outline of his shoulder blades. He wondered what it would be like to feel it with his lips. “Me and Mike made up our plans, remember? We told you guys earlier? For Beverly’s birthday.”

The mention of their friend made Richie falter a little bit, and Eddie seemed to notice. He pulled back a little, then kissed Richie once, gently. When he pulled back again, he pressed their foreheads together, and Richie’s eyes fluttered open. Eddie slid his hands down from Richie’s face, only to wrap his arms around Richie’s neck.

“For Bev’s—Yeah, I remember now. The thirteenth is tomorrow? Already?” Richie leaned up a little to give his friend a peck on the lips, just to let him know kissing was definitely still on the table, but took a second to catch his breath. “Okay. Diner. Uh, what do we need to go there for?”

“Been saving up my allowance for food,” Eddie explained patiently, his warm breath fanning over Richie’s spit-slicked mouth. “I don’t think we can really afford decorations, but Ben and Bill said they could try to do something. Ben’s got music, at least, and they’ll both bring drinks.”

“Bill said he thought about Christmas lights, but there’s no electricity down there,” Richie nodded, his brain finally catching up. He thought for another few seconds, his thumb rubbing gentle circles into Eddie’s skin. He recalled back by the ice cream parlor, when Eddie didn’t want to buy himself another ice cream cone. “Huh. You were saving up to buy food? I can split with you, I’ve got my allowance, still.”

“If you want. Thanks. Mike was going to cook some stuff, too, so we probably don’t need that much. You’ll come to the diner with me?” Eddie asked, starting to fiddle with the small hairs at the back of Richie’s neck.

“I’ll come to the diner with you,” Richie agreed, barely having to think about it. Of course he’d go with Eddie. Why _wouldn’t_ he go with Eddie?

“Okay.” Eddie hesitated for a second before offering, a little softer, “Do you think I could… Can I sleepover with you after?”

“Wh—You mean, like, after the party? Just us?” Another beat of hesitation, then a nod from Eddie. Richie nodded, too smiling a little. “Yeah, I—My mom wouldn’t mind, you know that. Do you need a cover?”

“I can just tell my mom all of us are at your house,” he offered, “so she thinks it’s a group thing, and she doesn’t like how upset I get when I can’t do group things.”

Richie felt his stomach do a funky dance move at the thought of Eddie lying to his mother to hang out with him instead of just sneaking out. He would be thrown off by the rebellion if it had been anyone else, but he figured Sonia deserved a little dishonesty, considering… everything.

“If you think that’ll work, then yeah. For sure, Eds.” Eddie nodded once before pressing forward again. They ended up messing around longer than expected, but Richie didn’t mind—Eddie had let him return the favor of licking and sucking at his chest, and it was just as fun to give as it was for Richie to receive. They had to keep quiet, but each of Eddie’s muffled whines and gasps would fuel Richie’s imagination for as long as he lived.

Eddie was still shirtless by the time Richie rushed out the window to get home before dark, and both of them had politely ignored the other was hard. Richie tried not to think about their tents until he’d scarfed down dinner and retreated to his room for the night.

The next day, Eddie showed up at Richie’s to drop off his overnight bag before they started their errands. Eddie and Richie halved the bill between large orders of fries, chicken tenders, and seven burgers. Eddie had wrapped plastic utensils in napkins as they waited, and made sure to (politely) ask for paper plates. They even made the last-minute decision to stop by the grocery store and bought a box of those really processed powdered donuts Beverly liked.

They biked with one hand on their handlebars, holding onto the food and boxes as best they could. They happened to cross paths with Mike when they were near the Clubhouse, and he graciously piled their food into his bike basket along with his homemade goodies.

Bill and Ben had rigged the Clubhouse with a bunch of flashlights by the time the three had gotten there, most of them with colored paper over the tops of them to create colored beams of light on the walls and ceiling. It was still plenty bright out, but the lights definitely made the place look cool and lively. Ben had brought a boombox, and he and Bill were eagerly sharing and trading music cassettes even as the others looked around to appreciate the cool spotlights illuminating the room.

They’d laid a clean tarp over one elevated section of the ground to place the food on, a corner of it already being occupied with some chilled liters of soda, plastic cups, and a few water bottles. Eddie made a face when he realized they’d have to put the food on the ground, but he helped carry things down from Mike’s basket and carefully place them on the tarp anyway.

“This looks really great, guys,” Mike complimented, and Bill and Ben beamed matching grins as they stacked a queue of tapes to play throughout the party. Mike let Richie help carry down his small trays of food as Eddie cleared space for them, including biscuits and greens and macaroni and cheese. The last thing to come down was two small cakes, which he carried with one arm as he carefully came down into the Clubhouse.

“I forgot to ask which kind of cake everyone liked, so I made two. Chocolate and vanilla,” Mike said, revealing the cakes in disposable baking trays. They were covered in a generous amount of frosting, the chocolate cake decorated with icing to say “Happy Birthday Bev” and the vanilla cake decorated with “Beverly’s Sweet 18th”.

The Losers cheered and passed plates around, and Ben held up a flashlight between the cakes as they sang an off-tune happy birthday song. Richie was the one to take an exaggerated breath in and blow in Ben’s face, and Ben flickered the flashlight a few times before turning it off to simulate blowing out a candle. They all cheered again, and Mike cut into the cakes to serve everyone else before himself.

“Anyone want some m-more soda?” Bill asked a few hours later, after countless games, mindless chatter, and even a reverse dance battle to some of the more upbeat cassettes (in which the worst dancer won. They had never heard Mike laugh as hard as he did when Richie ate a mouthful of dirt trying to do the worm). Richie raised his empty cup at the same time as he carefully drew a card from the deck in the center of their circle.

“Thanks, Big Bill,” he said as Bill stepped around the others and their empty paper plates to take his cup. Bill’s hand of cards laid face down on the dirt, and Richie considered flipping them over before deciding not to and returning to his own cards.

“We really outdid ourselves,” Eddie commented, sipping out of a water bottle with one hand before setting it down to adjust his cards. He and Bill had had a race to chug a few full cups earlier, and Bill had won. “I’m still not over the flashlights.”

“It was Bill’s idea,” Ben admitted, glancing back to see Bill’s little smile at the credit. He grinned in return, then looked forward again to pay attention to the cards game they were playing. “I had some colored paper at home, and he knew what to do with it, like, immediately. Mike, any sevens?”

“I’ve got some sevens,” Mike sighed, but there was a smile on his face as he picked the cards out of his hand and handed them to Ben. Ben happily collected his four matching cards together and placed them down beside himself.

“Richie? Any fou—hm. Any queens?” Ben asked, and Richie grinned.

“Go fish,” he chirped, and Ben drew from the deck.

“I’m gl-gla—happy we’re ab-ble to throw this party,” Bill said after he’d filled their cups holding them both in one hand. Eddie didn’t notice, but Bill paused and went onto his tiptoes for a moment to look over his head. He looked at Richie across the room, holding up three fingers.

“Eddie, my love, do you have any threes?” Richie asked sweetly, and Eddie frowned at his hand before picking out a card and holding it out. Richie plucked it out of his friend’s fingers and set down his matching set, the picture of innocence. Bill held up five fingers next, before stepping around again to return to his spot. “Eds, any fives?”

“Dammit. Here. And don’t call me Eds.” Eddie handed over the rest of his three cards, completing another set. “Asshole.”

“Thanks for being a gracious and humble player,” Richie snorted, and Bill sat down, picking up his cards. “Mike, any… aces?”

“Go fish.” Richie sighed, then set his cards down. He reeled back and stacked his fists, flicking them forward as he made a “whoosh” sound with his mouth like he was casting a fishing line. Bill leaned over to offer Richie his cup of soda.

“You have to do that every time?” Mike chuckled, as Richie pretended to struggle a little before miming reeling in a fish. He drew five cards from the deck, then accepted his cup from Bill.

“We’re playing Go Fish, aren’t we? Them’s the rules, Michaelangelo,” Richie explained, looking through his new cards with one hand. He glanced over his hand to look at Eddie, who had a little smile on his face at his antics. When he met Richie’s gaze, he rolled his eyes in mock exasperation. Pleased, Richie wiggled a little to sit up a straighter.

“Can’t argue with that. Eddie, any twos?”

“Go fish. Bill, any tens?”

“Go fish,” Bill shook his head, and Eddie drew from the deck after Mike did. “Like I said, I’m hap-happy to throw this party with you guys. Good idea, Eddie. Any nines?”

“Thanks. I just thought it would be nice,” Eddie said as he gave Bill a card. A few other turns passed, backed by the soft sound of a song only Ben seemed to know. When it was his turn again, Eddie asked Ben for cards. Ben didn’t have them, but Eddie said anyway, “I’m having fun.”

“Me, too. Bev would love this. Stan, also,” Mike said, watching as Eddie drew from the deck. He looked through his hand as he took a sip of soda, then asked Richie for a card and got a groan in response. Mike grinned as he completed a set, and placed them down. “Bill? I’ll take those nines from you. Ben, I’ll take your four, too.”

“You’re ruthless,” Richie complained, absentmindedly shuffling through his hand. He thought for a second, but agreed with Mike as he watched him organize his stacks, then ask Eddie for a card. “And you’re right. Stan would probably cheat, though.”

“How do you cheat at Go Fish? Go fish, Mikey,” Eddie asked, a little bewildered, as he pointed Mike to the deck. “Also, give me your ace, Richie.”

“I dunno, he’d stuff some cards into his shower cap or something,” Richie guessed as he gave Eddie a card. Eddie put down a set, then drew the rest of the cards from the deck when Bill didn’t have anything he needed.

“Speaking of, you think any spiders have gotten into the food? We didn’t really save the covers for the trays,” Ben pointed out, glancing at the large tin of shower caps they hadn’t used since the few weeks after Stan left. Eddie looked through his hand, then squinted at the food.

“There _better_ not be any spiders. I was gonna ask if I could take some food home,” he said. A few turns passed, and Bill ended up completing a set. Richie put down a set of his own with his last few cards, then leaned back with his hands on the dirty floor.

“Can we? Take some food home? I was g-gonna ask for some macaroni, Mikey.” Bill looked at his friend hopefully, and Mike’s shoulders squared a little in pride when the others murmured in agreement.

“Yeah, of course. Take whatever you guys want, I always have food at home. Perks of living on a farm.” He looked at Richie, then, a teasing twinkle in his eye. “Richie. You gotta let me make you a salad someday, man.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Richie snorted, and Mike rolled his eyes in good nature.

“You ate, like, a quarter of the fries, Rich,” Ben chuckled, taking a card from Eddie and making one last set with the rest of his cards.

“No one appreciates the endless void that is my stomach.” Richie patted his belly. Bill, Eddie, and Mike quickly wrapped up the game.

“I’m gonna make you take a plate of those greens home, Greasy McGee.” Richie grinned at Eddie’s blatant self-invitation to Richie’s house, even though they’d discussed it yesterday. “Also, I’ve got two sets total.”

“I have _one,”_ Bill sighed, but smiled as he held out his hand to allow the others to stack their sets. Eddie, then Ben, then Richie.

“Four,” Mike chuckled, gently placing his sets at the top of the pile. “I win.”

“Again? Good game!” Ben congratulated, clapping quietly a few times, and Mike pretended to bow a little as the rest of them joined in. Richie threw a tiny pebble in celebration, and they cheered when it harmlessly bounced off Mike’s shoulder.

Curfew crept up quickly, but it didn’t take much time to clean up. Mike let everyone take whatever leftovers they wanted, separating everything into plates topped with another plate. They shoved the trash into the garbage bag Ben usually kept in the Clubhouse, and turned off all the flashlights—after they flickered all of them on and off, of course, grinning and laughing at the strobe effect now that it was a little darker out and the beams of light were more pronounced.

They decided to leave the flashlights and boombox, and Ben and Bill carefully tucked their cassettes into their backpacks. Mike threw the trash bag up through the Clubhouse opening, then climbed up so the others could pass up their plates before they followed. Eddie kept most of the powdered donuts, and had piled whatever food he wanted onto Richie’s plate of leftovers.

They all biked languidly down the main road after finding a dumpster for their trash, talking and joking together as the sun continued to sink down. It was when the streets noticeably became more empty that they all biked to the Hanlon farm’s road. They waved goodbye and shouted their last thank yous to Mike as he pedaled away, then the four of them turned around to head back.

They all biked together to Ben’s house, then Bill’s, giving similar farewells to both of them. Richie and Eddie kept up the chatter for another minute, but fell into a comfortable quiet on their way to Richie’s house. Maggie and Went were delighted to see Eddie come over with permission, and gladly let Eddie borrow the house phone to check up on his mother.

“We’re all at the Toziers,” he confirmed for the third time over the course of the phone call. Richie was perched at the bottom of the brightly-lit stairs, watching Eddie speak into the phone that was just outside of the kitchen. He was fairly sure Sonia was taking care to drag the phone call out as long as she possibly could, but it had only been a few minutes. “Yes, mommy, Mr. and Mrs. Tozier are home. They greeted us at the door.”

Richie yawned a little and slumped against the wall, crossing his arms as he spread his legs out. Eddie nodded into the phone for a few seconds before his face scrunched up a little, and he looked over to frown at Richie. Sonia was probably ragging on him again, something like “You know I don’t like that dirty, dirty Tozier boy,” or “He’ll give you cooties and AIDS and flu, Eddie-bear!” Maybe both.

 _Joke’s on her,_ he thought as he smiled and lifted a hand to wave at Eddie. His friend’s face softened a little, and he waved back before turning away to talk into the receiver again. _I might be dirty, but Eddie sure doesn’t mind. And that’s all that matters._

“I know, I’ll be up early for school tomorrow. I did all my homework.” Eddie did not, in fact, do all his homework. He’d bummed off of Richie’s again. Richie really didn’t mind, but he really had to teach this boy some actual math before their quiz on Friday. “Yeah. Yes, I have my toothbrush and nighttime toothpaste. Yes, and pajamas. Yes, and I brought my blanket and my pillowcase and an extra blanket, just in case.”

Richie would’ve been amused if he hadn’t been so bored. When Eddie had gone back to nodding wordlessly, Richie stood up and waved to get his attention again. Eddie gave him a thumbs-up when he mouthed “I’ll shower,” and Richie headed upstairs to shower and get ready for bed. By the time he was done, Eddie was just coming up the stairs. Richie peeked out of his bedroom at the soft sound of footsteps, rubbing a towel over his wet hair.

“Yeesh,” he greeted when Eddie stepped into his room. He was stretching his arms out, probably a little sore from having to hold up the phone for so long, and moved over to where he’d left his overnight bag next to his backpack. He rummaged through it, brow a little furrowed. “You all good?”

“I’m good,” Eddie sighed in return, and glanced up and down at Richie in his sleeping clothes. Richie looked down at himself, too, but didn’t notice whether anything stood out. “I didn’t actually pack all my stuff, and I forgot to bring pajamas. Can I borrow clothes?”

“Yeah, dude, go for it.” Richie barely made it through half of his sentence before Eddie was at his closet, stretching his arms out all the way to move hangers around. Richie sat on his bed, towel on his head, as he watched Eddie grab a soft shirt and then rummage through the small drawers at the bottom to find a pair of boxers. “I’ll wait here.”

Eddie took longer than Richie to get ready, which was expected, but not very convenient after a really long day of biking and eating and socializing. Richie reread about half a comic before dozing, but he managed to wake up when his door opened up. Eddie stepped in, locking it behind him and traipsing across the room to stuff his laundry into his bag.

“C’mon, Eds, I’m pooped,” Richie sighed, lazily reaching out to set the comic on his bedside, where he’d already turned the lamp on, before wiggling himself over to leave room on the bed. He pulled the covers back and patted the space next to him, watching as Eddie rolled his eyes and went back across the room to flick off the lightswitch.

“Don’t be such a baby, Rich,” Eddie mumbled even as he yawned. Richie yawned right after, and Eddie finally slid under the sheets to lie next to him. He took Richie’s glasses off his face in one swift movement, folding and placing them gently onto the comic. The boys shuffled onto their sides, facing each other, and Richie let his long legs tangle themselves in Eddie’s.

“You smell like my soap,” Richie hummed tiredly, tucking both hands underneath his pillow. Eddie tucked one hand beneath but kept the other one on top, as per usual.

“Wonder why,” Eddie whispered, and Richie snickered. He wanted to keep talking, he felt like this sleepover was way too short, but he knew both of them were extra exhausted after such an eventful day. “Go to sleep. School tomorrow.”

“I had fun today,” Richie said honestly, letting his eyes drift shut. “I like hanging out with you and our friends. We probably threw Bev, like, the best birthday party ever.”

“We probably did,” Eddie agreed, and his hand on the underside of the pillow slid over to touch Richie’s. He sighed and deflated a little, like that tiny bit of contact took a heavy weight off his chest. “Too bad she and Stan weren’t there to see it.”

“We should be grateful though. They would’ve _smoked_ us in Go Fish.”

“Oh yeah, totally. You suck at Go Fish.”

“I literally won way more games than you.”

“You probably cheated.”

“Did not.” Richie thought of the way Bill would glance at Eddie’s cards every time he got up to fill a cup and tell Richie what cards he had.

“You’re fucking smiling, dumbass, you cheated.” When Richie opened his eyes a little, though, Eddie had a smile on his face. Richie didn’t think he minded all that much. “Go to sleep.”

Richie hummed in response, and observed Eddie’s half-blurry features with half-lidded eyes instead. He noticed while looking at his best friend’s eyes that Eddie was looking right back, and that despite the exhaustion of the day, neither of them wanted it to end. A few seconds passed, or maybe a few minutes, or maybe a few years.

“Hey,” Richie whispered lowly.

“Shut _up,”_ Eddie mumbled back.

“Can we kiss?” Richie asked, and Eddie gave him a lazy blink and half-smile in response. Richie moved, propping himself up on one elbow and moving his other arm across Eddie to brace himself on the bed so he could lean over the brunet. Eddie’s hand came up to cup Richie’s cheek, and when they kissed, he sighed through his nose in appreciation.

Their mouths were already a little dry with the urge to sleep, and it was barely energetic enough to really be considered making out; it was more like a long goodnight kiss, all patient slotting of their lips and slow tilts of their heads and quiet hums of content. Richie relaxed a little more with each passing second, melting down to lay over Eddie with his hand eventually finding a place on Eddie’s waist.

“G’night, Richie,” Eddie breathed after an eternity, his hand having moved from Richie’s cheek to hook under his arm and around his back. It was a warm, comforting weight, and it made Richie that much more tired.

“‘Night, Eds,” Richie managed, already on the brink of passing out. Eddie gently stroked his fingers over the soft space between Richie’s shoulder blade and his spine, and by the time he was done, they were both fast asleep.

Richie and Eddie were so worn out, they both chose to ignore the alarm clock when it went off the next morning. Eddie has just buried his face further into Richie’s shirt, and Richie tightened his hold on his friend to accommodate. They were drifting back off to sleep to the rhythmic blaring of the clock when Maggie knocked on the door loud enough to make the both of them jump.

“Boys? You awake?” she called, and Richie answered in a long, pained groan, punctuated with a mucusy cough. Eddie’s eyes were still closed, but he furrowed his brows in disgust. “Alright. I’ll have breakfast ready for you before you go.”

“Get off me, Eds,” Richie said bearily when his mom’s footsteps grew quiet, and Eddie rolled away without a word. He curled up tight, taking the blankets with him and leaving Richie suddenly exposed to the crisp morning air. “Fuck, asshole, it’s fucking cold.”

“Who’s fault is that?” Eddie grumbled, like Richie had any part in deciding the weather for the day. Richie sat up and looked down at his blurry best friend, who was hiding his face, but Richie heard his scowl when he grumbled, “Wake me up when you brush your teeth.”

“Yeah, yeah.” Richie knew Eddie would give him shit for letting him sleep for too long, so he rolled out of bed and made quick work of using the bathroom after a few seconds of finding his glasses. He tore the blankets off Eddie when he came back, and Eddie was too tired to make his grumbles coherent, but managed a good amount of cuss words between yawns as he trudged into the hall.

He was always so grumpy when he woke up, but Richie couldn’t help his grin as Eddie padded back into the room and glared at Richie until he turned around. Richie patiently stared at the wall while Eddie got dressed, then laughed when a balled up sock flew past his head and hit the wall. When he turned, Eddie nailed his face with the second sock, and giggled about it for the next few minutes.

Later, Maggie greeted them with pancakes small enough to fit into the palm of Richie’s hands. She only offered a sigh when he shoved three into his mouth all at once. Eddie ate them with a fork, politely thanking her for the breakfast and flushing pink when she tucked a lunch bag into his backpack just as she did for Richie.

When they got to school, Bill was just chaining his bike to the rack at the front. They greeted him happily, and Ben showed up soon after. They walked in together, deep in conversation by the time they noticed the assault pinks and reds spread across the hallway and paused. Derry High was around the same size as the middle school, but it had a much bigger main hall, which was currently decorated with streamers and posters and hearts.

“Oh, happy Valentine’s Day, guys,” Ben said kindly, not too put off by the decorations.

“I just remembered how little I see the color pink, and I sorta wish I could forget again,” Richie quipped.

“It’s not b-b-bad,” Bill said, glancing around a bit before continuing. The others started walking along with him, Bill and Ben in the front and Richie and Eddie behind them so they wouldn’t block the hall.

“There was supposed to be a Valentine’s dance, I think,” Eddie said, brows a little pinched. He spotted a pink poster on one of the large cork boards right next to the lockers, and tugged Bill and Ben’s sleeve. “Look, there.”

“Yeah,” Ben confirmed, glancing at his friends like he’d seen the poster countless times. “It’s in the gym, I think, and the junior class was in charge of decorating. Should we go?”

“No way,” Richie snorted, already turned away from the poster. “That’s, like, the girliest shit ever. Valentine’s Day is just a way to rake in a fuckton of money with chocolates and roses and crap.”

“There’s free stuff,” Bill offered, pointing out the part in the poster highlighting provided refreshments and food. Admission was two dollars at the door, though, and Richie somehow felt even less interested. “None of us had any p-plans anyway. Right?”

They all looked at each other a little awkwardly, as if one of them could have a secret date the rest of them didn’t know about. Of course, none of them did.

“Guests are allowed, too,” Ben said. Bill blinked at the poster for a second before Ben pointed at it. “We could invite Mike. He’s never been to our school before. He couldn’t make it to prom, remember?”

“Why would Mike want to come to a junior-made girl dance on a Monday? Why would _any_ of us want to go to this thing even if it wasn’t on a Monday?” Richie asked incredulously, a little amazed that they were even considering attending.

“Why wouldn’t we?” The three of them looked at Eddie with a little surprise, and he crossed his arms. “We should do it.”

“What? We just found out about this thing today. Ben didn’t even mention it, that’s how unimportant it was.” He pointed at Ben, who looked between the two with an expression like he didn’t want to get involved in… whatever this was.

“Yeah, and I want to go,” Eddie shot back, glaring at Richie. He was a little speechless at the sudden aggression, and resorted to looking at the other two as if to say, _“What did I do?”_ Instead, Bill and Ben glanced at each other before shrugging a little.

“It could b-be fun,” Bill offered, a little smile on his face at the thought of spending time with his friends.

“I think I have a few nice shirts. It says it’s semi-formal,” Ben read off the paper, his mind seemingly already made up.

“Then we’re going,” Eddie confirmed, a little flush to his cheeks. He kept his glare on Richie, who was feeling very attacked and very confused. Finally, Eddie looked away to smile at Bill and Ben. “We should call Mike after school, then.”

“I am _not_ going to a Valentine’s Day dance,” Richie exclaimed, but his friends were too busy talking about the dance to pay him any mind.

At seven in the evening, the Losers greeted Mike as he stepped out of an old, but well-loved truck. He was in nice, black slacks and a white cotton button-up, similar to Bill, except Bill had a red clip-on bowtie he’d bought for cheap somewhere in town after school. A light jacket hung over Mike’s arm, but he didn’t seem to need it yet.

“We haven’t seen the t-truck in a while,” Bill said, grinning as he watched Mike slide the keys into his pocket. The gym parking lot was brightly lit, and a few police officers were standing around in order to make sure no one snuck away to wander the town after curfew. Richie thought the lights made Mike’s smile look brighter than it actually happened to be, but maybe it was just like that.

“Man, how’s she doing? You have her for the whole night?” Richie asked, suddenly very aware of how long it’s been since he got behind a wheel. His dad would take him to get his license soon, since Richie had already driven around town a few times with a driver’s permit. He was a natural, Went had said, patting his shoulder hard enough to make him stumble in the driveway.

“Sure do. She’s doing good,” Mike chirped, spreading his arms a little bit. Richie noticed a pink tie dangling in Mike’s hand. “Are my clothes okay? I’ve never needed to dress up, so I borrowed my grandfather’s clothes.”

“You look great, Mike,” Ben offered, and beamed when Mike complimented him back. Ben was the most dressed up out of all of them, wearing black slacks and a red button-up with a black tie. He was the only one of them who wore a belt, which had a silver buckle that gleamed in the artificial light. His hair was even a little styled, gelled back all neat and sprayed into place.

Richie had always thought he was cute in a sort of sibling way, like Stan had been, but tonight he’d already made a few “Ben Handsome” jokes. He planned to make more throughout the dance, both because it was funny to make Ben blush and because he really did look nice. Plus, his name was an easy rhyme.

“Should we head to the gym?” Mike asked, and Bill nodded and started to lead the way. He, Mike, and Ben talked as they walked, and Richie let himself trail behind alongside Eddie. His best friend had been quiet even before Mike showed up, and Richie had yet to talk to him about it.

“What do you think of Mike’s outfit?” he offered, and Eddie barely looked at him to respond besides a millisecond glance through his long lashes, a smug little smile on his face.

“Nicer than yours,” was the reply. Richie bumped into him a little, and grinned when Eddie bumped him back hard enough to throw off his balance.

Richie had focused more on the “semi” in “semi-formal”. Maggie had been excited to hear about the dance when Eddie followed Richie home to get his overnight bag and mentioned it to her when she greeted them. She’d insisted he wear a pink shirt for the Valentine’s theme, originally one of his dad’s white business shirts that had gotten caught in the same wash as a bright red sweater.

She even wrapped him up in one of Went’s bowties (an actual bowtie, not even a clip-on!). Richie had won the battle against dress pants and ended up in black jeans, only because he let his mom take pictures of him in his little outfit without a fight.

The others had nice shoes, but Richie wore his normal, worn sneakers. His shirt was halfway untucked and his bowtie was already undone somehow, and despite Maggie’s efforts, he hadn’t taken a brush to his hair. She at least got him to move the overgrown locks out of his face, and his curls were tugged into a low ponytail behind his head. A few curls had fallen out of the hair tie and got in his eyes a few times, though, so the ponytail’s purpose was defeated.

Eddie wore nice black slacks like the others did, and his shoes were the shiniest out of all of them. He had a white shirt and red bowtie (the clip-on Bill had purchased came in a set), along with bright red suspenders. His jacket was red, too, and hung neatly from his shoulders even though Eddie hadn’t put his arms in the sleeves. His hair was styled as neat as Ben’s, but more casual.

“Am I allowed to know why you wanted to show up so badly?” Richie asked, quieter this time, and Eddie slowed a little. Richie slowed as well, letting the other three Losers gain a few feet ahead of them. “Eds?”

“I dunno, I… I just wanted, like, you know, to—I mean, how couples—” he struggled a little more, and Richie was too confused to ask what Eddie meant. He’d rarely seen him so tongue-tied before, but the shade of pink his face was getting was nice to look at. “I just wished we could, uh… That you could…”

“That I could what?” Richie asked, and Eddie decidedly refused to meet his gaze.

“That we—That you could ask me?” he said, more of a question than anything.

“Huh?” Their pace slowed again as Richie tried to make sense of Eddie’s words. He suddenly stopped, and Eddie nearly tripped over his own two feet to turn and face Richie, looking like a blushing deer in headlights. “You mean—What, like, you wished I could ask you to the dance?”

“Maybe,” Eddie said dumbly. Richie stared, eyes probably as wide as Eddie’s, and heat creeping up to his face as well. He barely noticed over the top of Eddie’s head that their friends had noticed them so far behind.

“Rich? Eddie?” Ben called, waving a little. He looked eager to go on, and Bill and Mike bounced on their feet like they were a little impatient, too. “You coming?”

“Uh, yeah,” Richie called after a second, not even looking at them, and Eddie stared back for a second. Then he whipped around to nod at the Losers once. Eddie marched on, and Richie was a little startled by the sudden movement before he started rushing to catch up.

“You guys okay?” Bill asked, and they both agreed profusely. Mike gave them a weird, confused smile, but none of them pried. Eddie didn’t look at Richie for a little while, still flustered, and Richie tried (and failed) to act like he wasn’t staring at Eddie for a few minutes straight.

They reached the gym by the time Mike fixed his pink tie and shrugged his jacket over his shoulders, and they each paid the peppy junior girl at the door two dollars. The inside of the gym was dim, and large pink lights were set up near the walls to point up at the ceiling. There were a few boys messing around one of them, shoving each other into the bright beam, and others crowded around another light to have lively chatter.

Richie glanced at Eddie, who was looking around with the same awkward energy as the rest of the Losers. When Eddie caught him looking, he stuck his tongue out. Richie stuck his tongue out right back, and Eddie grinned at him. As the other Losers kept eyeing the gym, Eddie’s hand moved to grip RIchie’s sleeve.

The bleachers had more students talking and joking with each other, punch and snacks in their hands, and Bill glanced over his shoulder to nod for his friends to follow him. The Losers moved to an empty spot halfway up the bleachers, and they all sat down, already chattering excitedly.

“I’m already so excited to be here, I think I just pissed my pants,” Richie said in faux-excitement, trying to reestablish his place in the conversation. Ben snickered as Eddie lightly elbowed Richie in disgust.

“Beep, beep, idiot,” he said, snorting, and then yelping when Richie swiftly snapped one of the red straps over his chest. “Ow, you fucking asshole, you’re going to stretch out my fucking suspenders!”

“That sentence was literally the dumbest thing you’ve ever said. Hey, hey, ow!” Richie laughed when Eddie started slapping at his arms and chest, then snatched his arms away when Richie tried to grab onto him. Richie poked at his side instead, and Eddie barked out a laugh.

“It’s not so b-b-b—geez, I can’t—It isn’t horrible,” Bill was looking out at the gym floor, then at the entrance, where more people were trailing in. Richie kicked at Eddie’s shiny shoes, and Eddie practically launched backwards to get enough space to kick at Richie’s knee. “I guess more people are going to show up later. Look, everyone’s just hav-having fun.”

“It’s pretty nice in here. The juniors decorated everything well,” Ben said, obviously excited. Eddie tried to get at Richie’s glasses next, but Richie managed to dodge his attempts. He jerked his head forward and feigned biting at his friend’s fingers, opening and closing his mouth with clacks of his teeth until Eddie snatched his hands away with a laugh. “And I’m pretty sure Belch and Criss and whoever wouldn’t care about coming. Look, it’s mostly couples and girls with their friends.”

“That’s the real reason you wanted to come, huh?” Richie sat on the bleacher above Ben, and playfully nudged Ben’s shoulder with his knee when he and Eddie finally settled down. “Cute girls and no bullies? Didn’t realize you were planning on getting some action tonight, Handsome.” Ben flushed and laughed him off, looking off to the side.

They hadn’t gone to any school dances this year, ever since Mike hadn’t been able to show up to junior prom. They’d spent half the dance wishing he could have come, until finally Eddie got sick of it and convinced them all to sneak out and run to the Hanlon farm, formal attire and all. Mike had fed them dinner leftovers that night, and Richie called his parents to pick them all up and bring them home. It was a nice night.

“The gym looks bigger on the inside,” Mike commented, looking around the building with a smile on his face. He looked like he was having the time of his life just sitting there with the rest of them, and, okay, maybe that made Richie a little happy about showing up.

“Should we get some p-punch soon? When the line clears up?” Bill offered, and the group agreed. The group wandered around for most of the night, drinking punch and sitting back at the bleachers with snacks and even dancing a little when the gym’s energy picked up. They became more relaxed as the night went on, with no evidence of any bullies crashing the dance and no classmates paying them much attention.

Mike seemed to be having a lot of fun, and he turned out to be the best dancer out of all of them. He moved fluidly, and when he was doing a goofy dance move, he beamed bright when it drew laughs from his friends. Bill stuck especially close to Mike’s side, and Richie thought his face must have stung with the amount of smiling he was doing.

Ben was less eager to dance, but loosened up when Eddie would shuffle and fist pump without much grace, but with an incredible amount of confidence. He and Ben were headbanging enough that their hair gel lost its hold, but neither of them seemed to mind. Richie managed to get his hands on Eddie’s head exactly once, and he’d shrieked at him until Richie had to lean on Mike during his laughing fit.

Richie was, undeniably, the worst dancer. He reveled in the laughs he got from his friends. At some point, he got Bill to air guitar as he banged invisible drums to an especially upbeat song. They had a tight circle formed, Mike usually ending up in the middle as they cheered him on, with Eddie shaking Richie whenever he wanted to watch him dance, too. They were probably the rowdiest in the gym, and laughed the whole way off the dance floor when a slow dance finally interrupted them.

Mike didn’t get to sit down for long, though. He and Eddie were laughing at something Richie said when a girl came up to the group, a short junior student with braided, blonde hair. Mike looked up at her when she made her presence known, surprised at first, but offering a smile.

“You’re the-the Hanlon boy, right?” she started shyly, and he nodded. Before they knew it, Mike was asked to dance, and ended up grinning up at them from the gym floor where the girl’s hands rested on his shoulders and his hands respectfully held her waist. They were swaying to the slow song being played, and when he looked down at her to say something, she even laughed.

Richie eyed Mike’s straight pink tie, his neat hair, the sleeves of his shirt folded up to the elbow. Of course he’d get a girl to dance with him. The four of them on the bleachers watched their friend, a little bewildered, but more amused than anything. Richie feigned applause when Mike glanced up at them again. Eddie followed suit and gave a silent cheer.

“Look at that guy. He doesn’t even go here, and girls are just lining up,” Richie chuckled, and the others grinned at each other. Another few girls came up just then, and soon, Bill was the one being led to the dance floor by a girl in glasses. They were less smooth than Mike had been, especially since he was dancing with a girl he didn’t know at all, but the pair fell into a rhythm eventually.

“Okay, wow. Girls really take this Valentine’s thing seriously, huh?” Eddie agreed with Richie, looking down at his friends with a tilted head.

“Ben Hanscom?” Ben looked up, surprised, at a cute brunette with a pretty pink dress. Her hands were folded in front of her.

“Uh, yeah?” Ben was already shrinking into himself, assuming the worst, but the girl looked even more shy than he did. Richie and Eddie shared a glance.

“Would you like to dance with me?” she asked, and Ben gaped for a second. He pointed at himself, and she nodded.

“Are you—Uh, you sure?” he asked, and Richie and Eddie eyed the girl warily, ready to defend their friend if it came down to it. “With me?”

“Yes, with you. I want to.” She got a little pink in the face, then. “Oh, but if-if _you_ don’t want to, I understand, I can just—”

“Oh, no, no, no, I just—If you’re sure! I’d love to dance with you.” Ben scrambled up to his feet, and the girl put a girl over her heart with a relieved look. She carefully rested her hands on his elbow when he offered it, and they walked off just as Richie heard her complimenting his shirt.

Richie and Eddie watched them join the rest of the couples on the dance floor, ending up near Bill and the girl who giggled when he stuttered through a sentence. Richie figured now was a good time to talk to Eddie. It felt like he hadn't gotten a good word in the whole night, what with all the dancing.

"So, Eds," he started, but Eddie was already downing the rest of the punch in his cup as he stood, with his red jacket in the other. He’d taken it off earlier during their dancing, and his dumb suspenders were on full display. Richie frowned, then Eddie kicked his worn sneaker with a shiny little shoe as he slipped his jacket on.

“There are girls who are looking over at us. Do you want to go to the bathroom with me?” he asked, his eyes flitting to his right. Richie noticed a couple of girls giggling to each other as they started to approach, and his hand held his own cup of punch a little tighter.

“What, you too shy to spend time with the ladies?” Richie teased, even as he stood and followed Eddie down the bleachers. He glanced at the girls as they went, who stopped to watch them leave. Richie would have felt bad, but he imagined one of them asking Eddie to dance and immediately quickened his stride.

“Come on, come on,” Eddie giggled, passing a trash can on the way to the restroom near the entrance of the gym. Richie quickly downed the rest of his drink, the punch sweet and strong on his tongue, before tossing his cup into the trash after Eddie’s. They speedwalked past people who weren’t interested in where they were going, and Richie couldn’t keep the grin off his face as he slid into the bathroom with Eddie.

“Oh, it’s like a whole different world in here,” he commented when the heavy door swung shut behind them. They moved to the wall, finding all the stalls and urinals unoccupied. He looked at Eddie, who was eyeing the door with a little smile on his face. Eddie liked being quick, and Richie grinned when his best friend met his eyes. “Did you plan past this point, or did you just want to run?”

“It’s not like I had a choice,” Eddie said, meaning he just wanted to run. He started to lean back against the tiled wall, then seemed to think better of it and stood up straight again. “I didn’t feel like dancing.”

“Me neither,” Richie lied, then heard some footsteps outside the door. Eddie heard it at the same time, and they looked at each other with wide eyes before rushing away to the handicap stall at the back of the restroom.

The door swung open just as they locked the stall door, grinning and shoving at each other as they tried not to laugh. They stayed quiet, making faces at each other when they heard the sound of whoever it was pissing, then the flush of the urinal, followed by (thankfully) the rushing water of the sink. The person left, and they burst into quiet giggles when the door swung shut.

“Why did we hide?” Eddie snickered, pressing close to Richie’s side without touching the wall.

“I don’t know, I followed you,” Richie said, shoving his glasses up his face.

“I followed _you,”_ Eddie shot back, and they started laughing all over again.

The lighting in the bathroom was much different than the lighting in the gym: there were harsh fluorescent tubes in here, for one. Richie had caught a glance of his reflection in the mirror when they entered, and the lights casted harsh shadows of his glasses onto his face. It was startlingly bright after spending hours in dim, rosy light.

Even then, he thought it looked good on Eddie. He liked being able to see all the details of the boy’s face—every freckle, every eyelash, every loose strand of gelled hair falling over his forehead, every little shadow when he smiled so hard, his eyes creased. Richie hoped Eddie got those permanent smile wrinkles when he grew up.

Eddie caught him staring, still huffing out the last of his laughter, and grinned. Richie felt his face heat up a little at how _happy_ he looked, even happier than when Mike did the dumb lawnmower dance in the middle of their circle and Eddie nearly fell over when Richie tried to copy him. He felt like he’d do anything to see Eddie this happy for the rest of his life.

A beat passed before Richie suddenly gained the rest of his senses, and the slow music from the gym flooded his ears even through the muffling restroom door. His mouth had fallen into a dopey little smile at the sight of Eddie obviously enjoying himself, but his grin came back at full force when he straightened and offered a hand.

“Eddie Kaspbrak?” Before Eddie could reply, Richie practically threw his top half down with his arm still extended. “May I have this dance?” Eddie paused for a second, surprised, then laughed again. The sound bounced off tile and graffitied stalls, and Richie snorted at the bathroom tile he was staring at.

“That was dumb,” Eddie chuckled, taking Richie’s hand and tugging him up to stand. He clasped their hands together and put his other on Richie’s shoulder. When all Richie did was stare again, Eddie rolled his eyes and took his friend’s other hand to place it on his own waist. His hand moved back to Richie’s shoulder, closer to his neck this time. “You’re so dumb.”

“You’re the one dancing with me.”

“We’re doing more standing than dancing.”

Richie took that as cue to sway a little, and even though he’d meant it as a joke, he started to like this. Eddie matched him and the muffled song’s rhythm, lightly stepping side-to-side a few times before starting to turn. Eddie’s face relaxed a little, and he sighed a little as he let his head fall onto Richie’s chest. Richie could feel him relax, and had to look at the ceiling to get a sense of which way was up.

“You tired from all those shenanigans on the dance floor?” he said, quieter than he meant to. Eddie hummed a little, letting Richie lead him right, then left, then right.

“A little. The dance is ending soon, I think.” Richie made a sound to prompt him to continue, so Eddie did. “‘s probably why they’re playing slow songs now. Get everyone relaxed a little before they ramp up the energy one last time.”

“Didn’t know they planned it like that.” Richie never bothered to pay attention to the music at whatever school dances he and the others had decided to attend. Eddie shifted his head a little, so his cheek was pressed to Richie’s chest instead of his forehead. “Getting real comfortable there, Eds.”

“You like it,” Eddie snorted, and Richie laughed, feeling Eddie smile against his bouncing chest. He let go of his hand to slip his arms around Eddie’s waist instead, and Eddie slid his arms over Richie’s shoulders in response. They were infinitely closer like this, barely able to move now that their torsos were pressed together, but neither of them minded.

Richie did like it, but he didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to. Instead, he sighed a little and rested his chin on Eddie’s hand. He thought about Eddie getting all worked up earlier, stumbling and stuttering over his words before. He’d been so upset when Richie didn’t want to come because he wanted Richie to be able to ask him to the dance.

 _Like other couples,_ Richie remembered. Were they a couple? Did Eddie _want_ to be a couple? Holy shit, the idea of it made him get a little sweaty. Was it hot in this bathroom, or was it just him?

Eddie sighed quietly, seemingly content and completely oblivious to the buzzing of Richie’s head. Richie screwed his eyes shut for a second, then let out a silent breath before opening them again.

Richie agreed with Eddie. He wished they could dance in the gym, with all the other couples, so he could show off how close they were. He wished he could see how the dim, pink lights looked on Eddie’s hair, just so he could bury his face into it.

He pressed a kiss to Eddie’s hair and felt him melt into his chest a little more. The fluorescent lights still stung a little, and the music was barely audible, and each step in the silent stall was a little too loud to be ignored; but Richie decided dancing alone was just as special as dancing in front of everyone else. _Eddie’s the only one I want to impress, anyway,_ he figured. For now, he hoped Eddie wasn’t disappointed, He hoped Eddie felt the same way.

That week, Richie tutored Eddie for the math quiz that turned out to be a big test. Eddie was nervous and snippy the day it was supposed to be graded until he saw the big red A on his paper. The Losers congratulated Eddie and even gave Richie a few pats on the back, even though he usually got As to start off with.

Eddie was stuck at home for most of his eighteenth birthday the next month, but Richie opened the door to him grinning with a plate of cake in his hands later that night. Maggie and Went let Eddie stay over, and they stayed up till past midnight to cheer in whispers when Richie turned eighteen, too.

They invited Mike in advance to prom, and he was able to make it this time. They had actual, fancy suits, and met up at Richie’s house to take pictures. Mike had picked up the others, but Ben’s parents insisted on driving him to the Toziers so they could take pictures, too. He and Eddie didn’t dance in the restroom like they did on Valentine’s, but they stuck by each other’s sides the whole night and cheered when Mike got swept away by a pretty girl again.

“I want to do this all the time,” Eddie breathed the night after the dance, their mouths separating so they could catch their breaths. Richie wished he didn’t have to breathe. His hand tangled at Eddie’s hair at the back of his head, where he’d been holding him against his lips to make their mouths tingle. His other hand rested on Eddie’s thigh. Eddie was sitting between Richie’s legs, but slung his own legs over Richie’s hips.

“We can, if you want,” Richie murmured, Eddie’s hand splayed over Richie’s undershirt. They were still mostly in their suits, but Richie had unbuttoned his shirt sometime near the end of the dance. Eddie giggled a little, softerfar than the belly laughs he’d been doing for most of the night, and kissed him sweetly. It was chaste, but Richie tilted his head up to follow his mouth before Eddie pulled away enough to grin at him.

“I wish,” Eddie said, running his hands down Richie’s chest, his stomach, then around to his waist. His big brown eyes followed his own hands, watching himself touch Richie, but Richie stared into Eddie’s eyes the whole time. Had his lashes gotten longer?

“We should,” Richie tried again, and Eddie just offered another smile that was a little sad this time. Richie frowned a little, and Eddie leaned in to brush their lips together just softly. It was enough to wipe the frown from his face, but there was still a little crease in Richie’s brow. “Why not?”

“Your hair’s gotten longer.” It felt important, the reason why Eddie was shying away from an answer, but Richie didn’t want to make a fuss. It was prom night. Eddie would tell him whatever it was whenever he wanted to. Richie brought his hand up from Eddie’s thigh to run a hand through his own messy hair, which he’d been tying up a lot more lately.

“Yeah? Think Mrs. K would want to give me a haircut just like yours?” Richie realized, even as he said it, that Eddie’s mom might be part of the reason Eddie was being cagey all of the sudden, but Eddie snorted. He let go of Richie’s waist to run his hands over Richie’s hair himself, prompting Richie to let his own hand drop. Eddie brushed the black curls away from his face and reached behind Richie’s head, working slowly and calmly.

Eddie leaned in close as he carefully tugged out the hair tie, his chest radiating warmth right at Richie’s face, and Richie felt himself go lax at the feeling of Eddie’s soft fingers running over his scalp. He sighed and let his eyes slip shut as Eddie brushed out his hair a little with his hands, then gently collected it back into the hair tie. He’d had trouble with it at first, but over the past few weeks, Richie liked to let Eddie tie his hair back. Eddie leaned back again, and Richie hesitantly blinked his eyes open.

“You looked really good tonight, Rich,” Eddie said, and Richie could have died happy right that second. Instead, he moved his hands around to the base of Eddie’s spine and the back of his neck, and drew him in to make their lips meet again. Eddie grinned against him at first, cupping Richie’s face with both hands and letting Richie smile back so their teeth clacked together. Then Eddie melted a little closer, and they let their expressions fall a little so they could kiss each other properly.

Senior year picked up its pace, and soon, the Losers were flooded with homework and exams and sleepless nights. Even then, they studied together, visited Mike when he was able to accommodate them, and studied some more. Mike’s workload had started to increase with the approach of summer, too, but they made the time to hang together. No one said it, but it felt like their time was running out.

“I’m leaving soon,” Eddie told him one day, and Richie knew deep down in his gut everything would come to an end, but he didn’t think it would happen this _soon._ They were in the Clubhouse, and the other Losers hadn’t been able to hang out much today. Richie and Eddie had spent some time with their friends after school, but mostly had the afternoon to themselves. “Right after graduation.”

Richie didn’t know what to say. He didn’t really want to say _anything,_ as if not acknowledging the conversation would make it stop. He was in the hammock, and Eddie hadn’t joined him. Instead, Eddie was sitting on the floor across the room, knees up to his chest, his face already going red like he was trying not to cry. He looked so small.

“... Why?” Richie asked finally. He stared at Eddie, but Eddie didn’t look back at him. He was looking down at the dirt and dust-covered ground, toeing at the filth with his sneaker. Eddie’s face twitched, and Richie’s mouth fell open. It was like he meant to say something, but he couldn’t come up with any words. He could make a joke here: _I always figured you would make me speechless one day, Eds, but I gotta say, what I imagined had way more smooching._

“My mom,” Eddie said, because why else? Richie wasn’t surprised, but at the same time, he didn’t see this coming at all. He must have been so deep in denial, he didn’t even realize he was drowning in it. “She wants to move. New York, I think, she didn’t tell me much.”

“Probably because she doesn’t want you to tell us,” Richie said. He meant to sound mean, and angry, and rude, but his voice came out entirely too flat and sad. “Eddie. You can’t.”

“I have to.” The tears finally came, Eddie’s round babyface quickly becoming stained with tears that he tried to wipe away, but couldn’t get rid of. “Richie—”

“No. No, no, no, let’s—Eds, we can figure it out,” he offered, sounding a little more sharp. Richie didn’t dare blink, and he imagined his eyes looked huge behind his magnifying coke-bottle lenses. “Eddie, we can run.”

“Where would we run?” Eddie choked out, and Richie shook his head as if to shake the sound out of his head. “Richie, I just wanted to tell you first. I couldn’t—I needed you to know first. I almost told you after—after prom, but I didn’t. And then there was barely any time after that, we barely got to hang out together, and I-I didn’t… I...”

“Did I tell you my dad is _this_ close to giving me his truck? He wants to get a new one, it-it was going to be my graduation present, finally, if you could just come over after graduation, then we could make it. We could run.” Richie swung his legs off the hammock, nearly falling out of it.

“We can’t,” Eddie said, stupidly logical. His nose was all red, and his eyelashes were clumped together. Snot ran over his upper lip even as he sniffed and wiped at it with his forearm, and he still wasn’t looking at Richie.

“We can,” Richie inisted. His chest felt heavy, like his heart had just turned to lead and steel and fell right onto his stomach to make him queasy. “Eddie, I can’t—We can’t lose you. Not like Bev. Not like _Stan.”_

Beverly, he missed bad enough. They hadn’t known each other nearly as much as he knew Stan, but losing her felt like losing a part of himself. The Losers had just become complete, and so soon afterwards, one of their newest members had left. Stan had been one of the original four, though, had been friends with Richie even before Eddie had joined their small group, and he left just two years after Bev did.

Losing Beverly felt like losing an irreplaceable best friend—because she was—but losing Stan felt like losing a _limb._ He didn’t want to think about what losing Eddie would feel like.

“Richie,” Eddie started, but Richie didn’t let him finish. Instead, he jumped off the hammock completely, starting to pace back and forth and trying incredibly hard not to step towards Eddie. He needed to think, think, _think._

“I have money, you know? Allowance. I could always find more, in the house, our emergency money. This is an emergency,” he claimed, because it was. Without Eddie, they wouldn’t be the same, but Eddie without the six of them? _He’d be so lonely._ He _was_ so lonely, before he met Bill, who met Stan and Richie.

“Richie,” Eddie tried again, and he was sobbing now. Richie didn’t look at him, instead keeping his eyes trained up on the ceiling when he stopped his pacing.

“I know where my dad keeps the keys to his truck, and I know how to pump gas, and I haven’t driven in a few months but I still have my license.” Richie didn’t know what else he would need. He knew where to find his family’s emergency stash, how to drive a stick, how to fill up a tank, how to book a motel room. He knew how to make some food, like pasta, and cake from a box, and he knew how to bring groceries in with two trips. He knew all he would really need was Eddie.

“Richie,” Eddie sobbed, and sniffed, and wailed. Richie turned away from him, his back to Eddie, shoving his glasses up over his forehead so he could rub at the tears starting to fall. “Richie, we can’t, you know we can’t, you have to—”

“Tell me you don’t want to run away,” Richie begged, shutting his eyes tight. “Tell me you don’t want to steal my dad’s truck, and you don’t want to live in some sleazy motel with bed bugs biting us every fucking night, and you don’t want to live off microwave dinners, and-and french fries, and macaroni.”

“I can’t. I can’t. Richie, we can’t.”

“I want to run away with you. Say you wouldn’t come with me.”

“You can’t just—Rich, you _know_ we can’t.”

“Then say it.”

“I—I...”

“Why not?” Richie asked. But he knew well enough. He cried over the hammock, and Eddie sobbed behind him, and they weren’t even looking at each other but Richie felt like he was suffocating in Eddie. He wanted to suffocate in Eddie forever.

“Do you know why I wanted to kiss you?” Eddie asked back, trying to choke down his ugly, guttural sobs. Richie’s face stung with the salt of his tears, and he felt like his sleeve was rubbing his face raw when he tried to rub them away. “Do you know?”

“I think I know,” Richie’s voice cracked, and it felt like his chest went right along with it. It felt like his sternum was cracked wide open, bearing all of himself, and like if he turned around Eddie would see it all. Or maybe he’s already seen it.

“Good. Good.” He heard Eddie’s sneakers scrape across dirt as he stumbled his feet, and he heard his footsteps come forward, and he couldn’t fight back the sob that had been building in his throat when Eddie touched him.

His hand touched lightly to Richie’s back, more of a graze of his fingertips than anything, but Richie felt like the slight contact had pushed his soul out of his body. It almost felt like he was a ghost, and he could only watch himself as he flinched forward and start bawling like a baby (like the baby he’d been when Maggie and Mrs. Uris had brought him and Stan together for the first time in preschool, and Stan had lightly kicked his knee on accident when sitting down, and Richie had promptly burst into tears).

Richie’s fingers curled into the hammock, between the strong strings that connected the cloth of it to the hooks holding it up to the sturdy support beams on the ceiling. His free hand searched, gripping the edge of the thick fabric, then rejecting it a moment later and instead grabbing at the empty air by his side. Eddie’s hand met his, and Richie finally turned around.

He barely got a glimpse of Eddie’s flushed, wet, ugly-crying expression before he released the hammock to grab his best friend and tug him close. Eddie clung right back, gripping onto the back of Richie’s shirt and Richie’s hand and crying into his chest and leaning into him. Richie stumbled back a little at the force of which they flew desperately at each other, and sat himself in the hammock that had felt important ever since he’d taken part in a verbal agreement that he didn’t even consider upholding.

Eddie climbed onto him and Richie turned, both of them working together to fit each part of themselves into the other like the world’s most difficult, two billion piece puzzle. Eddie ended up completely on top of Richie, arms and legs wrapped around him like a koala and head shoved into Richie’s chest. Richie held tightly to Eddie’s side, his back, letting his hand roam up to Eddie’s neck and through his hair.

“I’m sorry,” Eddie cried, and Richie could barely take an unsteady breath in before pressing his cheek to the crown of Eddie’s head. His hair was soft, but Richie had already started to get it damp with tears. “I don’t want to go. I’m so sorry.”

“I know,” Richie cried, and he would’ve kissed Eddie on the head except Eddie started crying even harder, and Richie followed because he followed Eddie no matter what. The crying stopped after a while, but they were both clinging to each other well past curfew.

Eddie had to leave Derry one month later, the day right after graduation, and all the friends he would be saying goodbye to were on his lawn before it was even light out. They talked and laughed and watched the sun rise above them, and even offered to help Eddie load up his luggage, which he adamantly declined. They promised to keep in touch, pretending it worked for Beverly and Stan, and pretending it would work for Eddie.

They biked after Mrs. Kaspbrak’s station wagon to wave goodbye until their legs started to burn, and then they kept pedaling even after that. Eddie waved back to them the whole time, his right arm sticking out the passenger seat window and moving quickly side to side. His hand was almost hypnotic, and the boys raced to keep it in their vision for as long as possible.

The station wagon made it out of sight after a few minutes, but they kept biking and biking until they reached the edge of town and slowed to a stop to stare down the stretch of an empty road. No one talked for a few minutes, panting and sweating and watching the heat waves bend the distant horizon into wobbly lines.

They promised to call, and write, and stay friends forever; but Beverly and Stanley promised to, and they didn’t. Eddie promised as well, just a few hours ago, but they knew he wouldn’t, either. They didn’t say it, but the four of them were afraid of doing the same thing. Bill and Ben and Mike and Richie cried right there in the middle of the empty road, and Richie wondered if Eddie was crying, too. He hoped he was. He didn’t want Eddie to _not_ cry over them.

That night, and for many nights after, Richie dreamt of brown hair and brown eyes and a universe of freckles. He dreamt of smiles and frowns and shrieks and laughter and weak slaps and wrestling matches. He dreamt of red shorts and white socks and two black fanny packs and a watch that always beeps. He dreamt of ice cream cones melting on the ground and sweet punch in plastic cups and kisses that make him feel like the entire world has stopped spinning.

When Richie left Derry months later, he always forgot why he woke up crying until he forgot to wake up crying in the first place.

When Richie comes back to Derry twenty-two years later, he sees brown eyes and freckles and a tight smile, and his lips tingle like he’s just been kissed for the very first time in his life.

**Author's Note:**

> i plan to write more for this fic (or the concept at least) since the ending isn't as suffocatingly happy as i want it, so hopefully i get it done quick. for now though thank you lots for reading! i hope all of you are staying safe during quarantine!
> 
> please please consider leaving a comment if you enjoyed! each and every one makes me weep! you can also find me on twitter @kaspbussy


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